Nueva Academy
by corrupt exchange
Summary: Harry's locked in Azkaban for life. Or so he thought. He comes into his magical inheritance and is spirited away. Now he's at Nueva, where students are seduced by Incubi, Vampires snarl and fight for the submissive newbie, and the Werewolves want him too.
1. Visiting Times

Nueva Academy

**Summary:** AU - Harry's locked in Azkaban – for life. Or so he thought. He's come into his magical inheritance a year too early and is spirited away. Now he's at Nueva, where students are seduced by incubi, the vampires snarl and fight for the submissive new kid, and the werewolves want to mate and mark said kid. Did Harry mention that his demonic teacher has some sort of issue with him too?

To make matters worse, he's even gotten a psycho ex-headmaster on his trails, followed by an ex-best friend and his little sister. Well, at least he has a werewolf who thinks of him as his cub, a dog for a godfather, and a greasy git for a 'parental figure'. Life's never normal with Harry.

**Warnings: **This will be male/male, slash!, het! Rating may or may not go up, depending on readers and their wishes. It is OMC/Harry, Sirius/Remus, Snape/Lucius, Neville/Luna and more.

**Disclaimer**: I owneth not the amazing and magical world of the Harry Potter series, sadly, the lovely writer J.K Rowling does. Howeverrrrr, I do own this story line in this fan fiction.

**Guys; here's a tip – read the times.**

Chapter I – Visiting Times **  
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><p><span>Twelfth of July, 1704 Pacific Time, 12 Grimmauld Place<span>

"Pray, tell me Minister Fudge," murmured the elderly man, deceptively calm. "How did a boy; of sixteen years of age, without a wand, and in _Azkaban_, escape?"

The said man shrivelled up in response, his shoulders sagging and quivering in fear of the Supreme Mugwump, "D-Dumbledore, sir!" Behind him, he could see one of the Weasley sons cover up a snicker. He snapped around angrily. "Do you find something funny, Weasley?"

Ron covered up his snort behind a hand, his eyes flashing as he glared angrily at the Minister for putting him on the spot. He had been 'accepted' into the Order alone, his twins for brothers turning down the offer politely. Or in a way they thought was politely. Something along the lines of: 'you can go shove that offer up your arse, you dirt licking scum!' They had said more, but Ron had found his mother of seventeen years covering his ears with a horrified look on her face.

Things had slightly gone to hell after that, with Molly Weasley belting out loudly that the stupid twins had better get their heads screwed on straight or she'd do it for them!

He could still remember her face as the twins had looked at her with revulsion, glanced at each other then muttered, "Like hell we'd ever let you get within three feet of screwing us in any way." It had been the pure disgruntled, monotonous voices that had tipped Severus Snape, who burst out in dark chuckles. The 'greasy git' as Ron referred to him as, had quickly replaced his laughter with an indifferent scowl and glare.

The ex-best friend of the Gryffindor Hero was snapped out of his thoughts by his boss's next sentence – a simple few words which snatched and demanded everyone's attention.

"I specifically told you to assign double the amount of guards, Cornelius, because tomorrow he comes into his inheritance."

Blue eyes did not twinkle. If anything, they froze the very ground that the Weasley patriarchs, the Minister of Magic and various others members of the Orders' walked on.

A gasp from Ron. "Shit, his…his inheritance starts tonight! How long do we have to find him?"

"I suspect that Harry will be inheriting a long dormant Magical Creature in his blood," The headmaster regarded him coolly in the next sentence. "And we have fewer than seven hours to find him."

The Order was thrown into panic as Albus Dumbledore, Vanquisher of Grindelwald and Heralding Saviour of the Light rattled off orders, orders which specified the retrievement of an emerald eyed, inky haired teens person –

–much to a distinct persons pleasure.

.o.

Twelfth of July, 0358 Pacific Time, Azkaban

A small body lay huddled on a mat, a thin sheet of material separating his tatty clothing from the harsh coldness of the prison cell. His eyes took on a decidedly glazed sheen as yet another visitor passed by his cell.

By Merlin, you'd think that the Minister or something would have created some laws regarding visiting times! It was bloody three in the morning – and the fact that it was almost four didn't make a flip of a difference. He made himself snarl at the offending person who waved at him like he were a dog, and unsurprisingly, he didn't find it hard at all to slobber at them, his eyes taking on a crazed glint that sent them backtracking to the bars of the empty cell opposite his.

As the person all but ran away, he flopped over onto his stomach with his head cocked to the side, listening. No sound was made, as he was the only prisoner on Cell Block D - safe. Biting his thumb lightly, he hovered his body over the freezing stones and drew four runes, his mouth hissing a swift '_aberto_'.

The surrounding area around the runes creaked softly, rising up slowly from the ground. It took a while for the dust to settle, and by that time the young teen had ravaged the case, ripping off the top and twisting around.

He paused briefly, his body half way into the case and listened. Still no one. Deeming it safe, he quickly clanked down the steel ladder and entered his multi-dimensional case, the musty air entering his lungs. He reached the bottom, muttering softly to himself as he hurried towards the bookshelf on his right. He had no time to explore, he was in a rush. He couldn't have one of the dementors pass by, only to find no one in his cell but an open luggage – that would be a huge give away to the fact he'd had it since day one.

Currently he was situated in his compartments cavern where he had chucked in as many books, as fast as he could, into. He had been owled by Fred and George just before his capture, demaning that he get his ass out of the Leaky Cauldron and run for his life. It was a warning that the Order was coming for him, and he had had barely even ten minutes, shoving everything he deemed a worldly possession into the waiting area he had.

Harry considered himself rather lucky. The summer just before his warning and capture, he had spent his days in the Hogwarts Library reading up Ancient Runes and Travelling, when he had stumbled across the handy rune which could enchant boxes of any kind, preferably larger than a shoe box, and turn it into a study room; much like the one he was currently sifting through. He had enchanted it to shrink at the word '_encoller_', and open at the word '_aberto_', written also in his blood.

Once he'd had that down to pat, he had stocked up on books – loads and loads of books, heck, he'd bought almost a thousand due to the fact that he had though he was going to waste away his summer at the Dursley's. Lucky enough, it turned out he'd be rotting in Azkaban instead.

It had taken him a year or two (he wasn't quite sure of the date anymore) in Azkaban to find enough time away from scrutiny to be able to read his books in peace. Over time, he had found himself immersing himself deeper and deeper into the books.

Now though, he had one last book to read; the last of his lot. He was rather pleased to find that book in the corner at the back, and quickly grabbed it by the spine; _Blood Inheritances for the Faint Hearted – G.L Runer._

Intriguingly enough, it housed details on the top schools around the world for every being – magical creatures, muggle-borns, purebloods and half-bloods alike.

Hogwarts, unsurprisingly to him now, was not even ranked in the top fifteen. Rather, it was the _twenty-fourth_, only! And after all that time Dumbledork had bemoaned about how grand and first class it was – bullocks.

Gripping the book tightly he stuffed it into the waistband of his rags and began his ascent, tiredly rubbing his eyes as he reached out of his luggage and into his cell once again. Slipping onto his mat and wrapping his sheet around his shoulders snugly, he prepared himself to read, utterly unready for the burst of light that blinded him.

The teen choked back a squawk and stumbled to the side, his arm raised over his eyes. After a long silence, he slowly lowered his arm, blinking away the dots that blemished his vision. He blinked again after another moment of staring at the book; this time in confusion.

He could have sworn that there wasn't a letter as he'd flicked through it at the bottom of the stairwell earlier. Tentatively he poked it, wary of any hexes or curses that could be flung at him. When dangerous attacked, he picked it up between two fingers loosely.

It was made of a sort of paper – stronger though, as he struggled to open it. It was clear white, unblemished but for the clear penned cursive which was tacked neatly onto the front. He bit his lip, before unravelling its contents and sitting back on his heel.

_To Harry James Potter – our beloved son,_

_It's amazing, isn't it, to realise that one moment your life is perfect – the next, it is nothing more than a never ending nightmare? I must admit, I held hope you would never have to read this letter as undoubtedly, we both know what this means of mine and your father, James's, fate. Harry. Your father and I both love you very much – never forget that, no matter what hellish forces you may face._

_Did I mention that you have magical entity bloods?_

_No? Pity. Well, you find out now. _

There was a scribble at that part, and Harry couldn't help but clack his teeth together. Lovely way to find out he was going to turn into an animal of a sort.

_Prongslet! It's your father here, don't mind what Lily-flower said. She's insane, er _beautiful_. And yes, she just slapped me. Well son, it's grand to talk to you like this (in a way, it's weird you know, knowing that I'm sort of talking to myself) albeit a bit saddening. I had wished to see you grow up – and smash those Malfoy's in Quidditch, studies, or anything, for that matter!_

_But at least I rest knowing that you already do. (You do, right? I can't have the Malfoy's beating me in anything, capiche?)_

_Back to the point. What you mother was saying earlier though too bluntly, which is why I've overtaken her place, is that you are special. Harry, your bloodline is that of a higher fox– a fox that the demonic Kitsune's are derived from, to be exact. Once you hit your seventeenth birthday, on the thirtieth of July at the last hour, you will come into your inheritance. Before we get buried between your gasps of astonishment I have just a warning - you have one minute; grab the belongings you need, you will be transported to a safe house. Read the rest of this once you have reached there!_

He tore his eyes away from the page, mouth gaping. If…If he could really get out of this hell hole, he didn't care if he was part wolf, fox, demon or whatever!

With a quick slam to his luggage compartment, he made sure to hold it tight within his arms, fingers still gripping the letter with fervour, a small quirk of his lips. He couldn't wait to be free. He would show Duckydork that he was sane – more than sane, actually. His touch on reality hadn't diminished in the slightest, and he'd had the time span of a year plus more to mull over the offenders which had placed him into this hell hole.

His hands shook with an undefinable emotion as the letter lit up, the bright light illuminating his cell and the dingy hallway outside his metal bars. His eyes widened as he felt a tug on his navel, yanking him to a place unknown. The last thing he saw was his sheet of ragged material in a messy tangle floating in the air before drifting down – and then nothing.

.o.

He fell on his rump – that much he knew, as his ass was currently rather sore. He glanced around the room half-heartedly, the realisation that he was currently out of Azkaban not having sunk in yet. He was pretty sure it would though. Dropping his trunk to the floor, he spied a couch, plunking himself down with relish. He'd spent way too many nights on those cold floors to not enjoy the feeling of soft leather beneath him. With a soft sigh, he picked up the letter and pinched his nose. Harry had an inkling that he'd have a splitting headache soon.

_So you're safe now, right? I guess an explanation's in order here._

Harry snorted. His father was damn right.

_Right now you are situated in a safe house, North-West Italy, Genova. This place was built by my many times great grandfathers for the sole purpose of safety should any of us Potters be persecuted for any reason. Your mother and I visited a seer who warned us something may befall you, and we set to work. Harry, it pains us both to not be able to nurture you and help you grow into a fine young man, but know we are watching you. So no funny business until you come of age!_

Harry snorted. Typical, most thought he wanted to go on a shagging fest, which wasn't true! Females held no appeal, though Cho and Fleur had swayed him a little.

_Now for details on your heritage – as I said before, you are a Kitsune– a form of fox. No, you are not like the werewolves who are forced to change as the moon shines, but are of a higher class. You can change at will, and yet still hold an animagus form. As a Kitsune you are not of the same breed as most, but have ties with your ancestors who are the royalty of them. You our son, are not only a Kitsune, but a Magi Kitsune, one who holds the power over healing, elements and nature. Oh, and easily acquired wandless magic, too._

_You are powerful. Some who you inhabit the same air with will find you repulsive, but not for the reasons you are thinking. They will find you extremely hard to be around, and generally hate you for one reason – they are jealous. They may even wish to harness your power through mating with you. Magi Kitsune's have mate/s to protect them from harm, and their mate/s have been predestined for them. _

_However your mother and I have been lead to believe that one of my ancestors had been drugged and forced into a mateship with one who was not meant for her. Due to the severity of the situation which messed up the whole linage, causing the genes of the Magi Kitsune to jump from generation to generation, even skipping some wholly, we have found some who have their sights on you. Some who will stop at nothing to have a Magi Kitsune under their control. _

_Son, our dearest son, be wary. We are regarded highly in the Goblin world, who will undoubtedly swear fealty to you as they have to us. We ask that you visit Gringotts as soon as you finish coming of your inheritance, and that you emancipate yourself. We, like most, come into our inheritance at seventeen – however our kind experiences much more pain due to the fact that you will be growing new…appendages, per say._

_Once you emancipate yourself, the goblins will explain more. _

_We must sign off here our beloved son, as time is ticking. Hours, days, months or years on you will find other letters tucked away safely somewhere. You will discover these letters slowly and surely. All the best, Harry!_

_Lily Potter, nee Evans  
>Wife to James F. Potter<em>

_James F. Potter  
>Lord of the House of Potter<br>Lord of the House of Gryffindor  
>Lord of the House of Ravenclaw<br>Lord of the House of Ilnoches_

He placed down the letter slowly, emerald eyes glazed over. He was a Magi Kitsune? Well, snap. He hummed lowly under his breath, before stretching his arms and legs. He may as well explore this safe house.

Light streamed in from a window, enlightening the room and bathing it in golden sunshine. The room was simply furnished, with a large bed and canopy in the corner, a wardrobe of simple wood, and a couch, table and desk in the corner opposite the bed. The desk was what caught his interest as he ran his fingers over the light oak wood.

Weird. There wasn't any dust on it. Quills and parchments were stacked neatly on one side of the desk, and Harry contemplated sending a letter to someone, before realising that he had no one to send one too. It was a depressing thought. Briefly he considered the Weasley's, but squashed it quickly. He couldn't chance Molly or Arthur – lord forbid Ginny or even Ron seeing it. He shuffled the parchment in his hand thoughtfully.

He'd had years to muse over the betrayal of his best friend and CO. Frankly he wasn't too torn up about it anymore. However if you'd've asked him about how he felt about the situation once he had first gone through it, you probably wouldn't even have been able to see the next dawn.

Moving away from the desk, Harry made his way over to the door, entering the next room which appeared to be a small kitchen, complete with the necessary equipment for baking, grilling and frying. All in all, he was quite pleased. Although his thoughts kept returning to the fact that he needed a new wand.

Glancing out the windows, he found himself physically and mentally tired. Making his way back to the bedroom, he threw himself onto the bed, knocking himself out to the world.

.o.

Silk against his bare skin stunned him to awareness, his back immediately upright; posture rigid, before he relaxed minimally, regaining his senses of where he was. The room spun around him, his eyes decidedly glazed and bleary. He rubbed his nose, wondering where he'd put his glasses. Then he froze, confused.

"It's bleary," he murmured to himself, a feeble attempt at trying to placate himself. "But I'm wearing my glasses. Oh gods, don't tell me I need stronger glasses already…"

Sighing, he threw off his glasses and pushed himself further under the warmth of his quilt. He would deal with it in the morning—

"What the hell?"

His scream pierced the room and bounced right off the walls and echoed around – lucky the place had built in silence wards. Backtracking to the matter at hand, he picked the sheets off his lap and stared downwards at himself.

He remembered wearing clothes to sleep.

He swore, he wore clothes to sleep.

So why in the world was he as bare as a newborn baby?

_No_, he shook his head numbly, he didn't want to know. He closed his eyes once again, absolutely unready for the burn of fire that pierced through his body, burning every nerve ending and every synapse. The electrical impulses fizzed and sped up, their pulses raging up towards his brain, relaying every creak of his bones and every burn in his body to him in great detail.

Too much detail. He was swamped with pain; dagger-like pain, pinching and stabbing into his skin and twisting. The raven haired teen wailed loudly, his bones compressing and condensing into thinner, harder fibre, his skin re-stretching and shrinking to fit his depleting body. Pain burned behind his eyelids, and he could hear a scream cut through the air as the inferno burning through his body diminished for a second.

Quiet peace, but for his heavy panting. He didn't let himself sink into the embrace of it, his instinct telling him that the worse was still to come.

How right he was.

He felt as though someone was skinning him alive, his scalp raw with pain as something sprouted out. His spine arched in a torrid display or flexibility, as though orchestrated by a sadistic puppeteer who wanted to see how far his minions could bend until they broke.

He sweat profusely, but he refused to give in to the darkness. Blood ran down his forehead, black as petrol and tainted with the stench of death. Something pierced just above his ass, and one last ear-piercing shriek filled the air; before silence.

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><p><strong>Author's Note: <strong>Er. So. Do I carry on, or not? That is the question. Was this interesting for you guys, or boring? Is there any things that you guys want incorporated into this storyline? Go on, you know you want to reply.

**Posted 20/4/11**

**Edited 22/4/11**


	2. With Ears that Flick

**Warnings: **This will be male/male, slash! and het! Rating may or may not go up. It is OMC/Harry, Sirius/Remus, Lucius/Snape, Neville/Luna etc. Oh, Manipulative Dumbledore, and not-so-lovely-Weasley's, some may be nice, though.

**Disclaimer:** Check previous chapter.

Thank you all who reviewed! You all truly made my day and inspired me to write even faster and more.

Chapter II – With Ears that Flick

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><p>Sunlight filtered into the room, the small body on the bed in a tangled mess of sheets. He lay curled up in a ball like a small kitten, ears flicking back and forth.<p>

There was a pause, before a shriek much like the nights before, filled the air.

"E-Ears, f-f-flicking?" he wailed as he stumbled for a mirror, half tearing open the wardrobe door in his haste. He stared, mouth dropped open in horror and shock, at the new, furry appendages he seemed to have acquired over the night.

Two very velvety, very twitchy, pair of ears seemed to stare out at him. They were dark crimson in colour, standing out blandly from his mop of raven hair. Hair, might he add, that was now waist length.

He squawked loudly in despair as he felt something flick behind him. He twisted around, only to throw his hands up and cup his face in dismay and slump down against the wardrobe, ass seated on the floor.

"I have a tail." He was rambling now; his mind half gone to another world. "I have furry ears. I have waist length hair. I look like a bloody girl."

At the last one, he shot back to his feet like a rocket, staring dazedly into the mirror.

It was true, he thought, in half indignation and half annoyance. His nose was now smaller and more refined; with higher cheekbones, slimmer cheeks and thick lashes. Although more feminine, he had the same features of an aristocratic heir. The scars that used to lay waste to his figure were now not as visible, having healed greatly overnight.

Mentally, he reminded himself to get a full body check over from a doctor.

The pallor of his skin tone had deepened from his pale white to a light tan, evenly spread and glossy (from what he could see) around his body.

With a swift bush of his hand across his bangs, he started in surprise. His scar, the lightning bolt which had dictated how his life had been lead - and defined who he was, was only very faintly there. Those who didn't know it was there would probably never notice, and those who did know, would have to look hard. He liked it.

And another thing he found he greatly liked was another simple fact; he no longer needed glasses. He honestly hadn't expected that to happen, and was pleased to see his mother-inherited-eyes staring right back at him. At least he hadn't lost that. It was still amazing in its former glory, but was now tainted by a ring of silver around his pupil – barely visible.

He assumed it had something to do with his father's side.

_I've grown. _He grinned at himself in the mirror at the thought, his height now a good five foot six. His shoulders were lean and rippled with corded muscles, and he found himself rather liking the fact that he was still small of statue. It would help others to think him weak and feeble. As his gaze travelled downwards towards his flat tummy and hairless chest, he realised one last thing before he tore into the wardrobe with fervour.

He wore no clothes.

.o.

After he had gotten dressed in a mad dash and frenzy, he sat stiffly on the leather couch, the letter in his hand. He had re-read over it, and was currently ready for his next task at hand – Gringotts. Flicking the hood of his jacket over his ears, he made sure that his puffy tail was comfortably seated within his jeans before retrieving his invisible cloak from his trunk. His pacing stopped at the sound of crinkling paper, to which he stared down in surprise.

"Huh."

Harry's eyebrows creased downwards in confusion as he started searching the cloak insistently, stopping only in disbelief as he stumbled across a pocket. He had owned the cloak for five years now, and only now he discovers this? Weird. Shaking his head in astonishment, he pulled out the contents, hefting them in the palm of his hand.

The object was a simple, non-descript tag of "_Blonkers Buckles_", attached to a small key. Gripping his belongings in a small bag he had found, he muttered the words, only to moan out in loud annoyance.

"Another Merlin created portkey?"

Then the tug on his navel was too much and he found himself spirited away, landing in a sprawled out heap on top of a goblin. He sighed. Maybe he should buy some shoes that stuck to the ground immediately after landing. That would take some looking in to.

"Mister Potter!" cried out the small goblin beneath him, "you's be in your inheritance already?"

"G-Griphook, sir," stumbled the young Potter heir, "it's nice to see you too."

The goblin was already on his feet, watching with what Harry swore was amusement and surprise in his eyes, as the younger one attempted to get his bearings.

Eyeing him speculatively, Griphook nodded to himself before turning to another goblin. "Bogrod! Get Ragnok!"

The other smaller goblin nodded before hurrying off to find his superior. It wasn't long before two other goblins arrived back; one of them, Ragnok, watching the human on the floor—or the not so human one on the floor, depending on the arguer's point of view.

"Harry James Potter," he mused aloud, "heir of the Potter, Ravenclaw and Gryffindor fortunes, and that's only for starters." His eyes sparked with an unknown emotion that Harry couldn't pinpoint.

Harry looked around warily, worried about being seen. He had, after all, just broken out of Azkaban, and knew for a fact that he was being hunted.

Ragnok noticed this and smiled slightly, "Worry not, young one. No harm shall befall you while your presence is held here in Gringotts. We have sworn fealty to your father and his predecessors in any case."

Harry nodded twice, before sighing in relief and smiling at the goblins. "That is wonderful." He hedged a little at what he was going to endure soon enough but stabilised his mind. His parents would not have led him into something bad. "I received a letter from my parents, informing me to come here. They said something of the sort that you would be explaining my accounts, and they asked that I get emancipated."

Ragnok nodded twice, signalling Griphook to move back with the other three goblins standing in the room. "We are in a secure room away from prying eyes, Mister Potter." He could still see the caution in the young ones eyes. He did not like it – Magi Kitsune's were respected by the goblins who had served them for many generations. The Potter's were the only real purebloods that showed respect of any form to them, and in turn, the goblins swore to protect them and them alone.

"Now on the statement of your accounts, firstly I must do a blood check. If you would, Mister Potter."

Ragnok held out a marble basin, watching as the youngling bit his thumb and dripped some blood in. He motioned for someone else to take the bowl. "They will run a diagnostics test to explain which other families you may belong to."

Harry looked up at them, emerald eyes wide. "Before you said I was heir to the Ravenclaw and Gryffindor, is that true?" Panic shined through, as the teen nervously bit his lip. He really didn't want more responsibilities!

Carefully the goblin replied, his voice calm. "It is true, Mister Potter,"

"Please, call me Harry," muttered Harry absentmindedly, twirling his hair around a finger.

"Harry," amended Ragnok, "as I have said before, I will say it again; do not worry. Us goblins have been in charge of the Potter fortune for many generations. We will not mess up now."

"No!" Harry through his hands up in incredulity. "I didn't mean it like that, sir, really!"

The goblin let out a chuckle, before schooling himself back to blankness. Goblins did not smile. Goblins also sure as hell didn't laugh. "It's alright, youngling. However, we have much to go through, and little time."

Harry cocked a brow at that, perching himself precariously on his seat, "little time, sir? I assumed we had all the time in the world."

"Not with the auror's, the Order _and_ Voldemort hunting you down, youngling. We must get you ready."

At this, Harry bristled, his ears starting to fold back in distrust. "Ready?" he snarled, "Ready for what?" He was sick of being used and then chucked away like a rag doll. He had had enough.

"Read for whatever comes your way, be it just survival and hiding, or adventure around the word." The goblin eyed the quailing boy speculatively, watching in amusement as the anger faded from the jaded eyes. "It is your choice." At these last words, the boy completely deflated, his shoulders hunched over.

"That's the first time anyone has ever said that to me," he whispered softly. A scowl lit all the goblins' faces, before they gripped themselves and composed their features. A soft knock echoed around the room as the door was gently opened.

"Ragnok, we have the results for the Son of James."

Ragnok nodded, pouring himself over the parchment in glee. He handed it over to Harry with something akin to sadistic pleasure, before turning around to the rest of the goblins. "Griphook, grab the rings of the houses of Potter, Ravenclaw and Gryffindor, and ready the cart to take us to their vaults.

Griphook nodded, excusing himself from the room in a flash. Harry, on the other hand, was frozen stark stiff, staring blankly at the sheet before him. He really was the heir to Ravenclaw and Gryffindor, along with some other house he'd never heard of before.

"Ilnoches," said Ragnok simply, understanding of the blank face the lad had. "Is the family that the Potter's are closely intertwined with. They are what allowed the Potter's the blood of Magi Kitsune."

The raven haired lad nodded dumbly, the words swirling before his eyes, before they snapped up at the leather boxes being placed before him. They were unadorned but for simple crests, crests he was very familiar with, himself having gone to Hogwarts. One was the signet of Rowena Ravenclaws' house, the other of Godric Gryffindor's.

Lastly two more boxes were placed before him, both similar in design to the others'.

"This is the Potter ring," explained Ragnok, "wear this on your right hand, ring finger."

Slowly the teen slipped it on, unaware of his surroundings as a flare of love and being loved rushed through him, the heat encompassing his body. His eyes were like blazing emeralds as he readied himself for the next ring.

"The Ravenclaw ring is worn on the left, index finger."

His brain felt addled and mushy as he slid on the ring, memories of a warm library and a crackling fire in his minds eyes. The vision switched to one of a dark haired lady and a blond man who was fiddling with a ring around his right index. Instinctively he reached out for the Gryffindor ring, unhesitant as he slid it onto the same finger as the vision.

The goblins swallowed a gulp, watching as the magic swirled around the youth, cocooning him. Inside the eye of the storm, Harry smiled faintly, picking up the last ring and sliding it onto his right hand, middle finger. It fit perfectly, and he was darned to admit that he felt a tangle and rush of magic emit themselves from the rings, wrapping around him and sinking into his core – melding within him.

And he found it was warm and safe.

He found himself resisting slightly when someone tried to shake him out of his trance. "Mist-Harry," corrected Ragnok worriedly, "Harry, we must hurry; we do not have much time left."

Harry shook his head to get rid of the throb. He smiled brightly at the goblins he stumbled backwards at the warmth. "Yep," he chirped, "What's next?" Laughter twinkled in his bright orbs, and the goblins were hard pressed to stay emotionless.

"Next we emancipate you," said Ragnok, shaking off his stupor much like Harry had. "It was difficult to find the right loophole with that fiend of a—" he broke off at the inquisitive look on the youngers face, reminding himself that he had a young teenager with fresh ears not to sully. He coughed. "As I was saying, we found the right loophole, and it is only required that you sign this." He slid a sheet of parchment over to Harry, who took the sheet and nodded to himself as he read along.

"So basically," Harry mused as he finished, "I am being emancipated since Fudge and that Judge, by sending me to Azkaban, ensured that I was treated like an adult. And by that, it means that I should be fully treated like an adult in every way, right?

Ragnok nodded slowly, pleased that the youth had caught on so quickly.

Humming slowly to himself, Harry bobbed his head before reaching for a quill and signing it. He bit his thumb, finishing it off with a dab of blood.

"Now that that's over with," Ragnok swept his hand over the papers, dispelling them off to his chambers where he would soon file them, "I was instructed to hand these two letters to you." He passed the boy two more clear white envelopes, before reaching out from underneath his desk. "We have only two more things to cover, young Harry, and one of them is a sacred oath which few outside of the Goblin Royalty have received. If you would please scoot back a little."

Harry looked on in amazement as a snap of magic bound the goblins together like a web.

"_We, the Goblin Entity in the World of Magical Creatures, claim here forth to use every means possible in our possession to protect, honour and serve even if it requires our lives. We solemnly swear to uphold his word and commands, and swear to provide sanctuary from opposing forces should the need arise, and to provide army forces should he require. We will never leave him nor disown him less he breaks any of the Higher Held Goblin Laws at his own free will. We swear this on the name of Ragnuk the First, founder of everything we live for. We, the Goblin Entity, swear this unfailing fealty to Harry James Potter, Lord of the Great Houses Potter, Gryffindor, and Ravenclaw and lastly of the Majestic House of Ilnoches."_

A string of magic from the young Lord erupted, tangling itself in the mess of other magic and being surrounded by them. Pulled, the large bundle of energy started to stream towards the teenager who now stood unsteadily on his feet. He was unready as it dove down towards his ankle, heat sheathing it before the lights dimmed again, and they were left in the room as it was before.

Glancing down, he noticed a small emblem just above his left ankle on the inside. It was the faintest hint of jade twisted and tattooed into his skin – the mark of the Goblins.

He grinned happily, aware of the small smiles lighting up the faces surrounding him.

"You said two things," Harry held up two fingers, before retreating one. "Only one more to go then?"

"Yes, youngling, and it will not take long." Rummaging lightly through his drawer, Ragnok pulled out a small pouch. "Have you learnt how to summon using runes?" At Harry's smile and slight nod, Ragnok carried on, "That is good, we will not have to use time on that, then." He passed Harry the small pouch. "This is a sort of letterbox. Just write any letter, addressing it to anyone you want at Gringotts specifically, and pop it into the pouch. Touch it with your wand—can you do wandless magic?"

"I can to a certain extent, but I'm not sure right now. I haven't used magic in a while."

"Well you should be able to in any case. Just hold your hand or wand on the pouch and utter '_enviar_' to send whatever it is that is in there. Be careful that you don't put anything that you don't want sent, as there's a possibility that you will not get it back from a long extent of time."

Harry nodded, eating it all up. "Is it possible to receive messages, or send messages to people outside of Gringotts?"

"My," deliberated the goblin thoughtfully amused, "we goblins are not good enough entertainment or company for you?"

Harry blushed, a pink flush staining his cheeks. "That's not it, and you know it, Ragnok," he knew the goblin was teasing him, and he also knew that he'd stopped calling the goblin 'sir'.

Ragnok chuckled. All of the goblins were now being able to show emotion around the youngling as he had been accepted as one of them.

"In accordance to your questions, yes; you may receive messages. If you receive a message, it will 'call out to you'. Don't worry; you'll understand what I mean when you receive mail. To your second question, again yes, you can send messages outside of Gringotts, however it will be through us, as it has to pass from here first. Make sure to write their names and addresses clearly on the letter so we send it to the right place."

Ragnok looked around at the rest of his race, silently asking them if he'd missed anything. Griphook stepped forwards, unworried, unlike how many of Voldemorts' circle would have reacted had someone stepped up to point out something.

"Sir, we must sort out how he will pay for items outside of Britain and show him to his vaults."

Ragnok hummed under his breath, tapping his fingers on the solid, wooden table. "Right, thank you, Griphook. Could you get Harry one of the debit cards? We will meet you outside the Gryffindor vault."

As Griphook exited the room, Ragnok motioned for Harry to follow him.

"We will go visit your vaults now," they left the room, entering a cart as Ragnok kept talking, "and as you know, Dumbledore had been taking money from there since you were two, until a year ago where we stopped him—"

He noticed the look of fury that entered his young friends' face. "You didn't know," muttered the goblin, half to himself before spitting and swearing in Gobbledegook, "You were meant to have received a letter stating what has been happening to your accounts!"

At the confusion evident on Harry's face, Ragnok snarled. "Since you hit the age of eleven, you were meant to have been receiving statements on the money that was being withdrawn from the Potter vault, and deposited to other accounts, particularly a Molly, Ginerva and Ron Weasley, along with an Albus Dumbledore."

The goblin was in his element, spitting fire and fury, "we assumed that you read our last letter to you concerning you were being reimbursed due to their incompetence and deceit. Clearly though," a look of hatred crossed the goblins face, "you didn't receive any of that mail."

Harry shook his head. "I can understand not receiving any mail these," he paused. "How long was I in prison for, Ragnok?"

"A year and a half."

"Well, I can understand why I have not received any mail this last year and a half, but I have no idea what happened to the previous letters. In fact, I have never received a single letter from Gringott's my whole life."

Ragnok stilled for a moment. "You received no letters during Azkaban?" At Harry's quick affirmation, Ragnok showed exactly why you would hate to cross a goblin. "Those bloody," he stopped himself a second before, catching himself, "Harry, you should have received letters in Azkaban, as stated in your imprisonment testament."

"They never said that!" yelled Harry, infuriated. "They just said 'lock up time, Potter', and then shoved me into the cell!"

Ragnok was shaking his head irately; just how many things had gone wrong and double-crossed the Young Potter Lord? "We will look into this soon, Harry. For now, we are at your Potter Vault. It is different from the trust vault which was set up for your schooling by your parents. Now that you are emancipated, you are able to access both."

Harry already knew what to do. Pressing some already-oozing blood onto the large door, they swung open for him, and he stepped in bravely.

He had expected the galleons of money, having already seen his trust fund. What he had not expected was the weapons and books, which were stored all around the room in cabinets, on the walls and on bookshelves. Pushing his way towards the back he stumbled over.

Twisting around he pulled it towards himself, studying it. It was a simple chest, the small gap for a lock, blank. He flicked it open with his wrist, unable to stop the small gasp of surprise that flitted through his lips at the amount of potion ingredients in there. He picked a few bottles out, reading the tags in surprise and astonishment.

_Vampire Fangs_

_Werewolf Blood_

_Basilisk Blood and Scales_

_Griffin Talons_

_Unicorn Blood_

_Phoenix Feathers_

There were many more, but he quietly packed them back in and turned to Ragnok who wordlessly shrunk it and placed it into a suitcase Harry hadn't seen him holding. It reminded the lad of the case he had stored all his books in. With that thought, he turned to Ragnok.

"Ragnok, do you think you could help me store all the books into the luggage, please?"

The goblin nodded and set to work to do exactly that.

Moving around, he attempted to find any more useful things to no avail. Slumping his shoulders in defeat, he was ready to leave for the next vault when he considered the two letters he held in his pocket. Perhaps one of them would have more information of what he could do now?

Harry unzipped the pouch around his waist and took out a letter, reading through it silently.

_Dear Harry,_

_You're journey has started – are you tired? Well pity, you're not even half way there yet!_

Harry's ears bristled at that, and he found himself liking his mom with a grudging respect at the way she was able to gain his attention

_You should have received another letter – read that, and take all the books you can and store them somewhere so you can read them in your spare time._

_Now, Harry, I must ask that as soon as you finish packing all your belongings, head to Knockturn Alley and go to the Seven Deadly Sins –at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, someone should be there waiting for you. I do not know if you have met him yet, but trust him._

_Lily Potter nee Evans  
>Wife to James F. Potter<em>

Sighing, Harry rubbed at his eyes tiredly. He was starting to get exhausted.

"Ragnok?" at the answering grunt, he carried on, "could you please help me get all the books in every vault? I would like to only visit the Ilnoches vault today, the others can wait," he looked shyly at the goblin – he didn't want to be assuming, "if that is alright with you."

Ragnok would have rolled his eyes if he were younger. "Youngling, you don't have to be so formal around me."

Harry blushed, before he slapped himself physically, muttering a soft, 'Harry James Potter! You are a seventeen year old male, stop blushing like a school girl!' – To which Ragnok laughed outright at.

Ragnok relayed Harry's orders to another goblin, who would also meet them at the Ilnoches vault like Griphook was, before the duo got on another cart which took off at speeds so high Harry swore he could feel his cheeks 'vumping' and wobbling at the pressure. After many dips, turns, slopes and curves that sent his young mind spinning, they were outside a very grand vault. A vault which stood at more than thirty feet high with its doors reaching to the ceiling. Stumbling forwards, Harry followed Ragnok who took him in hand and proceeded to press his ring against the door, followed by some blood.

A low, grating voice rumbled out after that, scaring poor Harry who jolted backwards.

"What's that?" he squeaked, watching as the once majestic door turned into a golem-like face. He was reminded of a sphinx, which he had read about in a book Hermione had forced on him.

"I?" Sniffed the voice, "I am the great Guardian of Ilnoches – Rubenus, and who would you be, small one?"

Harry glared at that. "I am not small."

"You keep telling yourself that," snorted the guardian, as though finding what Harry had said amazingly funny. "I've seen baby elves which were taller than you!"

"Elves are naturally tall! And they have a longer lifespan!"

"True," countered the stone face, "but at the same time you're naturally short. No way around that matter, young one." He ignored the explosive shout from Harry, turning towards the goblin. "Ragnok, why have you taken this small one to me?"

Ragnok who had been watching the affair take place with mirth looked up, wiping the emotion from his face. "He is the heir to the Ilnoches line; this vault is his."

"Presumptuous of you, Ragnok," murmured the voice thoughtfully. "I expected you of all people not to believe the humans and their intentions for wealth…"

Harry stared at the wall open mouthed. "I don't want the wealth, you rocky fool!" he felt stupid after saying that, and by the looks of the other two, they thought so too. "I don't need any more galleons, I just want to know my heritage!"

"Sure," mused Rubenus, "That's what all the humans say."

"Y-You—" Harry was lost for words, he never though he'd be able to say this, ever, but what an arrogant prick of a wall!

Ragnok stepped forwards, "Rubenus, you can see he is a Magi Kitsune, what more proof do you need? All realms know that Magi Kitsune's only came from the line of Ilnoches."

Rubenus snorted, "The kids got no ears—" Harry flicked off his hood. "He could just be a regular kitsune, you know." He was staring at Harry seriously now, watching the young boy. "Step closer, young one."

Harry was really getting tired of called small or young. It was alright when Ragnok said it; he knew the goblin well enough for him too. But a wall saying it? Now that was going too far.

There was a moment more of scrutiny before Rubenus gulped. "You're eyes are definitely a Magi's. You have the silver glimmer," he took off on a torrid of half mumbled, half jumbled sentences, debating with himself.

"Come on," muttered Harry, "I have to go meet someone at four!"

The wall was dragged out of its thoughts as it suddenly slammed its doors open, the abrupt movement sending dust and pebbles flying. Harry shielded his face behind his arm, before stepping in the brightly lit room. There was again more money, followed by armoury and books. He stared wondrously at a pair of blades wrapped in silk in one of the cabinets, before looking up at the Guardian who was currently on one of the walls.

"May I take these?"

The Guardian looked at him for a second, before nodding slowly. "You're the master, why ask me?"

"Because," replied Harry irritably, "you're the Guardian. You've been looking after these for years; it would be rude of me to just up and take them, wouldn't it?"

He received a slow smile, which edged the Guardian's lips up. "You are the first Potter in the last millennium that has said that to me. Take whatever you wish, young one. Might I suggest that you look at the bottom drawer of the desk."

Ragnok who was filing books into the suitcase jerked up at that. "R-Rubenus," shock colouring his tone, "you approve, then?"

Rubenus looked away with a harrumph. "I never said that! I just thought he might want to look in that drawer!" He couldn't meet the gaze of the triumphant goblin. "Oh shut it, you infuriating goblin. Even after all these years, you never change."

"And for that you are grateful," replied the goblin easily.

Harry was too busy fiddling with something from the drawer to pay any attention to the conversation behind him. He fingered the pendant he had withdrawn from the drawer just earlier, watching as the light shone on it, illuminating the brilliant colours and reflecting them. It was an amethyst dragon scale, hoisted on a silver chain. The dragon scale held a single rune which Harry couldn't translate. He slipped it over his head, letting it rest along his nape, the coolness of it contrasting with his warmth.

Finally he turned around to the still-bickering Guardian and goblin.

"May we leave? I still need a wand," interrupted Harry.

The Guardian looked up in surprise. "You're seventeen or older now, and you need a wand? What happened to your old one?"

"It was snapped and incinerated before my eyes," molten emerald flared at that, before they dimmer down with weariness.

The Guardian was slow to respond. "As a Magi Kitsune from the blood line of Ilnoches , you should find it easy to do wandless magic. Have a shot at levitating this book." He disregarded the shake of Harry's head with a nod of his own. "You can do it, go on."

Harry sighed, before turning to face the book in front of him, his nose scrunched slightly in concentration. He was slightly ashamed and sad to see the book didn't even shake.

"Guys, this isn't going to—" He was cut off by the wall Guardian, again.

"Focus!"

"Alright!" Harry threw his hands up in despair before staring at the book again, miffed.

His annoyance turned into shock, followed by apprehension as he took in the sight before him.

He'd blown the book right into the ceiling, dust beginning to stir and walls began to rumble.

"…"

Harry glared at the grinning wall face and goblin. "Don't say anything."

Ragnok grin broadened. "Wasn't going to. Anyway, we should be going now. Good day, Rubenus."

The Guardian inclined his head to the side in agreement, "Later, Ragnok, Lord Potter."

The last thing the Guardian heard as he creaked the door shut was a loud moan, "It's Harry!" – Chuckles, and then silence.

Outside the Ilnoches Vault, Harry stood opposite Griphook as the goblin handed over what appeared to be a credit card. "It works fine with those muggle conventions, converting it to the currency needed. However if you need galleons or sickles or knuts, just grip it in your hand and mutter the amount you wish to withdraw – make sure you have the exact amount as you can't deposit it back unless you're at Gringotts."

Harry registered and stored the information in the back of his head.

The goblins had placed a hasty charm on him so that his hair was now a dark, hazy crimson, and the ring of silver enlarging so that his eyes were now mercury in shade. They warned him that it would only last nine hours at the maximum, and that he should use the portkey that they handed him once he was finished with his business, to head back to the Potter safe house.

Thanking them deeply he smiled one last time at Ragnok and Griphook before walking out the doors, hood firmly stuck over his ears.

"Good luck, Mister Potter." The silhouettes of the goblins murmured together, "You will need it soon."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Notes: <strong>Yeeeees, I know, it was very detail-filled. Be warned! The next chapter will also be like that. I apologise if you don't like this, but it is necessary as the foundation to the story. I hope you stick with me through this! There was something else I should mention…Yes: My updating schedule? It should be one update a fortnight. I'm going to try this first, and if all works out, it'll continue. However if I run into problems, it might be extended by a week.

'Kay. So how was it? I already have the basic outline for Harrys' mates. But I'm wondering; do you guys mind multiple OMC's with Harry, or would you rather just one?

Tell me.


	3. Of Shadows and the Like

**Warnings: **This will be male/male, slash! and het! Rating may or may not go up. It is OMC/Harry, Sirius/Remus, Lucius/Snape, Neville/Luna etc. Oh, Manipulative Dumbledore, and not-so-lovely-Weasley's, some may be nice, though.

**Disclaimer:** Check previous chapter.

Alright – you reviewers, I totally love you all. I should have finished getting around to replying to you all by now. And I'm going to do this – currently the base word limit is five thousand words per chapter, but I'm going to make it that every ten reviews I get, I'll increase the base by 250 words. So uh, say I get 50 reviews, that's…ugh, I really have to brush up on my maths, is 1250 more words? Yeah. Anyway, this chapter is longer than normal, I hope you guys enjoy.

Chapter III – Of Shadows and the Like

* * *

><p>His shoes tapped lightly on the cobbled roads as he passed by witches and wizards who were on business. It wasn't yet close enough for the students of Hogwarts to be purchasing their needed items.<p>

A pang jolted through Harry as he realised he would never attend Hogwarts again. Never sit in the grand hall and joke around with Ron and Hermione, or play quidditch and beat Malfoy. He fought back the tears. No, Ron and Ginny were largely at fault for him being in Azkaban, having yelled and pointed at him during his court session, saying he was loony and dark.

His strides lengthened as the pain set in. Ron. His heart ached as he thought about his ex-best friend. Heck, he should be over the big oaf by now. The ass had betrayed him in the worst way – for his money, for his fame, and lastly, for the prestige and rank. It was low; Harry knew it— in fact people would have to be blind to _not_ see it.

Rubbing his eyes he paused in his steps, looking up. Somehow he knew he was where he was needed. Glancing back down at the letter in his hand again, he re-read it. Yes, Seven Deadly Sins. He cast a wordless Tempus charm, it was only ten to four o'clock— he still had awhile.

"Oh yeah, the second letter," he fiddled around his pockets before dragging out the second, untouched envelope. The seal on the letter was unrecognisable, and Harry found himself drawn to it. He skimmed it open, reading the contents to himself slowly.

_To Harry James Potter – Lord of the houses of Potter, Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Ilnoches,_

_Congratulations on your magical creature inheritance, Mr Potter. We cordially invite you to attend Nueva Academia. We are a diverse academy that involves magical creatures – and only few humans, as they tend to be biased and prejudiced against kinds that are different from theirs. Due to the fact they attack our diverse kinds, at Nueva we do not take kindly to that, ensuring that those Mundane Magicals are rather disliked. However we do still offer the option to them – though we must add that if you are pertaining to the thought that you would like to request a preliminary entry test for a Mundane, they may not come back. Alive, that is. _

_At Nueva, we offer an assorted array of different subjects that cater for the different species and races. Specialised courses such as Sex Magic for Incubi and Succubi, or Luna Cycle for Lycanthropes plus many more are included into the schedules._

_Should you decide to accept, please open the next seal and continue reading to pick your courses. Should you decide to not accept, please discard this letter and back a minimum of two feet away and watch the fireworks. We await your response._

_Sincerely,  
>Anita Lunciva<br>Headmaster of Nueva Academia_

His thoughts whirled quickly, churning out possible explanations, futures and answers. However all his thoughts seemed to end up in the same place – open it. And open it he did, unlatching the seal for the second part of the letter with relish.

_Again, congratulations, Mr Potter. _

_We are indeed very pleased that you have decided on Nueva. From the list below, please select your subjects, striking through those unwanted. You will be having four core subjects which are listed below. You may decide on three – ten extra courses. Please note that for some specifics there will be testing to ensure you have the magical capacity and necessary skills to take part. Please purchase the items stated beneath each subject. Also extra course books will be available for purchase on school grounds on the second day after it has been decided if you are accepted into them or not._

_Core:_

_Transfiguration: _

_From Black to Blue and Back to You by Edvin Taikech_

_Charms: _

_Spelling Your Way to Flying Pigs by Mythica Propogazne_

_Potions: _

_Brewing With Your Life on the Line by Henri B. Price  
>One standard silver or bronze cauldron<br>Glass or crystal phials  
>Mortar or pestle<br>Scales  
>An intermediates potions set<em>

_The Dark Arts and their Defence: _

_Dark Spells by Britt M. Fudge_

_Extras:_

_Blood Rites_

_Apparition _(X)

_Astronomy _(X)

_Ancient Runes_

_Luna Cycles _(X)

_Elemental Magic_

_Sex Magic _(X)

_Weapons, Physical Combat and Muggle Brawling – Offense / Defence_

_Duelling _(X)

_Herbology _(X)

_Healing_

_Warding _(X)

_Arithmancy _(X)

_Muggle Life and Culture _(X)

_History of Magic _(X)

_Occlumency and Legilimency _(X)

_Spell Crafting _(X)

_Divination _(X)

_Animagus Training_

_Necromancy _(X)

_Please note: Luna Cycles is an extra course which must be taken by all lycanthropes._

_When you have chosen, please press some blood onto the school emblem at the bottom. The bottom half of this letter should vanish from your hand. An ambassador will be by in two hours to help you with the purchasing of your items. Please make your way to a somewhere safe within the hour to allow them to pinpoint your location. We ask that you do not vary in your location after this hour._

_Thank-you,  
>Anita Lunciva<br>Headmaster of Nueva Academia_

Mentally he looked down the list. He quickly crossed of a few, before leaving behind the rest to narrow down. He didn't want to take occlumency and legilimency as he was already pretty good after having spent the last two years of his life shielding away his thoughts from the dementors and inquisitors. He was rather good at warding, if he could say so himself, along with duelling. However his muggle fighting skills were less than zero…

Finally he put down his pen after crossing out thirteen of them, leaving behind the following; Animagus Training, Healing, Weapons and Physical Combat and Muggle Brawling – Offence/Defence, Elemental Magic, Ancient Runes and Blood Rites.

Pleased with his outcome he followed the last instruction and pressed his bloodied thumb onto the school crest. He watched it disappear in a quick poof of dust. Wiping his hand against his jeans, he ignored the weird glances he received for wearing muggle clothing, and stepped into the Seven Deadly Sins.

Harry was pretty sure it was four o'clock.

He glanced around the shop intrigued by the amount of clothing he saw. Seeing no one ready to meet him, he decided he may as well go for a whole new wardrobe.

"Hullo Mister!" He whipped around to find a girl in her early twenties, outfitted with a lip ring and bright, violet hair. She smiled out at him, her pale blue eyes shining in the light. "I'm Vina, ya look like you's could use a hand!"

Grinning, the emerald haired teen nodded, "I could, actually. You think you know what'd suit a sixteen year old?"

Her eyes languidly traced his body, greedily taking in the sight of the slim, firmly muscled body. Harry was thankful that his inheritance had toned out his body and gotten rid of most of his malnutrition.

"Yes, why yes I do." She smirked at him as she started browsing through a section, occasionally throwing him some jeans, slacks and shirts. Sometimes even a belt came flying over, to which he ducked down in fear before catching it. "Ya has a name, young'un?"

"H-James Trace, nice to meet you, Vina," he controlled his features, mentally berating himself for almost letting loose his real name.

Blue eyes regarded him with understanding, before she nodded and moved on, continuing her barrage of clothing wars. "Ya sure yur sixteen? You act mighty ole' for som'un so young. Ya should loosen up a lil'. Stressin' out at such'a young ain't good, Jamesie."

He didn't comment on the nickname.

"Now totter on, young'un, go'n try'em on!"

With the mountain of clothes hefted in his arms he had no choice but to follow her instructions and make his way to the changing rooms. Slipping into a pair of tight fitted, plain black jeans, he smiled. He could get used to new clothes.

It was a while later until he finally finished sifting through the lot. Stepping out of the changing area with a slightly smaller pile, he made his way to the cashier where Vina sat blowing gum. The magazine she was flipping through was shoved to the side as she pouted up at him. "Ya not gonn' gimmie a lookie?"

Harry blushed, shaking his head lightly. "D-Do you think I could buy any shoes?"

She glanced at him thoughtfully before vanishing behind the counter. She was up again in a second, hoisting a pair of simple dragon boots that were dark red – almost brown, and lace-able. "They're durable, and're good for brawl'in', should ya need ta!"

He shook his head in wonder, wondering how she knew exactly what he was going to be doing. Smiling at her he paid using his Gringotts card, he pondered who exactly he was meeting when he bumped into the epitome of bad luck.

"Potter."

At least Harry knew he wasn't the only one that wasn't having an excellent day anymore - Severus Snape did not look pleased to see the lad.

It took Harry a second to realise something was amiss. "H-How did you know it was me, professor?" This wasn't good. He didn't want to go to Azkaban. Maybe he could just touch his portkey and leave before Snape could touch him. Yeah, he could do that. Or not. His hand was held in a tight grasp by the potions professor who was glaring daggers at him.

"Potter, stop thinking so hard. It's not right."

At least he knew it wasn't a fake Snape he was seeing.

But then again, that wasn't exactly the cheeriest of news' either. Maybe he should just disregard the warning and hex like mad then run? He rather liked that possibility. Making a stinging hex would get Snape off his back for good.

"Potter. I told you already, stop thinking. Your scheming won't get you out of this." His arm was tugged along as Snape pulled him into one of the corners of the shop, away from the prying eyes of Vina. She caught Harry's eyes as the teen was pulled away, her face slightly worried. At his nod though she went back to her magazine, looking up suspiciously all the while.

But hey! Dead bodies _did _also mean bad business.

In the corner, Harry quailed under Snape's impression of a basilisk. Unblinking, with a killing glare.

"P-Professor, could you let go now?" He fiddled about uncomfortably. The hand wrapped around his arm felt odd. Especially since it was Snape, his tormentor since his first year.

His arm was dropped like a burning poker stick, Snape's normal expression of disgust and hatred gone too. In fact, Harry was rather starting to miss it; Snape's weird look of bemusement and incredulity was starting to freak out the poor kid.

Then the thought that Snape could be his connection from his mom, hit him.

"No way," he breathed out heavily. "Mom wants me to trust you?"

Snape hissed loudly. "Yes, you impertinent brat, and don't you dare think I'm doing this because of you. It's for Lily."

Harry nodded assuredly. "Of course, sir. I would have it no other way. You treating me nice is starting to freak me out, though."

"Have you decided if you accept or not?" Harry blinked; Snape was taking this conversation to uncharted grounds.

"Accept? Accept what, professor-sir?" The teen couldn't for the life of him, decide on whether to address the man as 'professor' or 'sir'. Hn, the difficulties of a teenage life.

"The offer to Nueva, brat! Surely your long break helped with your thinking skills!"

Harry reared back, his ears standing on edge underneath his hood, hissing. "Don't act as though it was some holiday, _Sir_, you don't even know how hellish it was."

"Just answer the damn question, Potter. We don't have all day!"

Their interaction was starting to draw eyes from the couple which had just entered. Namely a Lucius Malfoy and his lovely wife, Narcissa. The arguing duo paid no attention to them, focused entirely in their angry spat. Curiously enough, Lucius briefly entertained the thought, along with his wife, that the two were lovers. But as they saw the clenched fists they quickly rid themselves of those thoughts.

"Why, so you can go tattle to the old man?" retorted Harry scornfully, "I'm afraid you're mistaken if you think I'd trust you with this information, Sir."

"Oh you infuriating—damnit, Potter, I'm here to help you," snarled the potions professor, clearly nearing the end of his rope. Unfortunately for Snape, Harry knew this.

"Help me back to Azkaban, sir? You'll have to excuse me if I'm not terribly welcome to this option."

A tick formed at the corner of Snape's eye, much to the sadistic amusement of the young fox. The young fox, who smirked wickedly at pushing his enemy's buttons.

Snape opened his mouth, stinging reply on the tip of his tongue when another voice cut through. "Severus? Is that you?"

The two whirled around, Harry peeking over the taller professors shoulders. He had to bounce on the tips of his toes to see and even then, he still had to hop a little. He rather disliked the silent reminder of his smaller statue. Maybe he would grow over the next year? He could only hope.

"Lucius, Narcissa," he nodded his head in greeting, smiling slightly at the aristocratic blond. "I apologise, I must finish sorting out my business with this…this _person _here."

Harry's nose scrunched up at the spat out 'person' which described him. He sounded like trash. He didn't like that. How mean of Snape.

Lucius peered over Snape's shoulder in curiosity. "Ah, bullying a small kid? Where are his parents, Severus? I would have thought better of you than to yell at a lost boy."

"I'm—!" A warm, calloused hand covered his mouth, and he tilted his head up to see his professor shaking his head slightly. Harry glared at the hand over his mouth, wanting nothing more than to bite that hand.

_No, don't_, he berated himself, _you may be a fox, but even you can't eat crap. He'll probably taste utterly disgusting. _Before he remembered something; Snape knew legilimency_. _His eyes widened at that, his mind snapping up even more barriers to encrust his mind with a shroud of impenetrable walls.

"Now if you will excuse us, we must be going now. Good day, Lucius, another time, Narcissa."

Harry jolted back to awareness as he heard these parting words, only to find himself subtly edged out the door, a firm hand pushing on his shoulder. They moved along quickly, their pace fast and wide as Harry found himself led towards the Leaky Cauldron. He was shoved forwards lightly by Snape, who exchanged a few words with the barman Tom.

"Right this way sirs, right this way."

They were led to a secluded table at the back of the room in the corner, obscured from sight by a large, and ugly, in Harry's opinion, potted plant.

He was rather quickly seated on a plush cushion, Severus seating himself opposite him.

"Now look, Harry," uttered the ever-to-the-point Severus Snape, "you may not believe me, but your mother made me your godfather, your father naming the mutt and wolf your other ones." He carried on, ignoring the fact that Harry's mouth had reached an all-time low. "Your mother and I were best friends and she was the one who encouraged me with my mate. I know I've treated you badly and such, but it was to show my allegiance with Voldemort was true."

"And the fact you hated my father."

Snape nodded, conceding that fact. "That too. It certainly helped with treating you badly, I must add." There was a slight glint of hilarity in his eyes that Harry was hard pressed to ignore. It made the git look younger, and dare he say it, happier.

"Harry," mentally, Harry started at that. He wasn't 'Potter', anymore? Darn. He was starting to get attached to being called his last name. "How much do you trust Dumbledore?"

Well, certainly, out of the all the questions he was waiting to receive, this had to be very near to the bottom of the ten foot long list.

How much did he trust Dumbledore? Interesting question.

Considering the fact that that ass of a man had left him with the Dursley's even after finding out about the living conditions and the marks and bruises left on his own body, Harry was thinking not terribly much. Also, he had to take into account that the man had allowed no one to speak on his account in front of the trial at the Wizengamot, and had been paying the Weasley's hefty sums of galleons to be his friends – yes, he'd found out about that during his second year from the twins who'd apologised profusely.

"Not much." It was a big step for him, as he acknowledged that the closet person he'd come to in terms of having a grandfather, was actually a bigoted scum. It hurt.

"Good." Snape eyed Harry silently for a second. "Did you accept your placement in the Academy or not?"

Taking a sip of the water in front of him, Harry opened his mouth slowly. He figured he could tell the man; it wasn't as though he had much to lose. Just his whole future and more. "Yes." A quick tempus charm also told him that he had to hurry. "Sir, I must go to the hairdressers now, I have to be back at my safe house in twenty minutes."

"Don't call me sir anymore, Harry." The man was getting up already, his coat being shrugged around broad shoulders. "People will think you are my student, bringing up unwanted questions. Call me Severus." At Harry's incredulous look, he smirked. "I'm your godfather, in any case."

Gobsmacked, Harry followed mutely, his attention on the fact he had three godfathers now.

Honestly. He wanted a godmother too. What were his parents thinking?

"In, boy, in." For what felt like the fiftieth time that day, Harry was pushed into a store, the tinkling of a bell alerting a pretty female who motioned him forwards.

She wore a pair of tight blue jeans and a grey halter top. Her hair was deep crimson and wavy, flowing over her shoulders and down her back in ripples. She grinned at him, studying his hair with a delighted click of her tongue.

"Awesome hair you've got there! I'm Evany, and you are?"

"I-I'm James, it's nice to meet you Miss Evany."

She smiled broadly at him. "You've got manners, huh little one! And you, sir?" She flicked her silver eyes over to Snape.

"Severus Snape, teacher at Hogwarts."

She bopped up and down to the muggle song that was ringing through, even daring a small giggle at the affronted look on Severus' face.

"So which one of you gents are needing the hair cut?"

Harry dragged himself forwards, his mind telling him to run. "Er, that would be me."

Her eyes sparkled brightly. And he knew he should have taken the option before it was too late. "Excellent! Just plunk your ass down here, James!"

Hesitantly he toed the chair before squishing down uncomfortably. She wrapped a sheet around his neck, and advanced with what appeared to be a maniacal grin, a pair of scissors and a comb in her hand.

He wished he could have lost his conscious, since he couldn't run.

Instead, he shivered and shook every time her scissors tickled his scalp or face, his dark green hair twirling around him as they fell to the ground. He refused to look into the mirror; instead closing his eyes, still jerking whenever she touched a ticklish spot. She was done quickly. But in his mind's eye, he wished she could've done it quicker.

"All done, James," she pulled the sheet off of him with a flourish, forgetting that there was still hair all over it. Harry choked and spluttered – it wasn't particularly nice having his own hair in his mouth. "Oh dear, whoops!"

Whoops indeed. He smirked at Severus who was looking at the girl unimpressed, before his gaze turned to Harry. The man gaped slightly, before he remembered himself and slammed his mouth shut with an audible click.

Harry stood with the back of his hair still reaching down to his waist - however the top of his hair was slightly long and naturally puffy and gravity defying, as they fluttered in harmony with the wind.

He rather liked it. However, there was the problem of his glamour fading. He turned to Severus about to ask, when the man ushered him out the door, already having paid the lady. "Sev," he ignored the glare at the nickname, "I didn't even get to say thank-you! That's horrible!"

The man grimaced, but allowed Harry to race back. He massaged his forehead with the palm of his hand.

"That boy will be the death of me."

Harry ran back to Snape- no, Severus, cheerfully.

"Sev, if I attend a new academy, what about my looks?"

"Luckily your mark is almost gone," the man was half talking to himself, by the looks of things, "I have heard about where you will be attending. No student's information is leaked out, and any that does leak out anything is swiftly executed.

Now this, Harry found amazing. They killed kids if they leaked information of another to those outside the school?

"But it still wouldn't be terribly prudent to send you, looking like you, out when you're being hunted."

Severus noticed the sarcastic 'no way, you're kidding' face Harry pulled, and tugged the teen's ear. "I think it would be a good idea to change just your hair colour."

Snorting, Harry knew why. "To get rid of my father?"

"It is still in the features of your face, but yes." Severus watched as Harry doodled idly in the air as they stood between two buildings in an empty alley to discuss this. "Just dye it dark blue or something, anything other than your black. Black hair and green eyes just screams 'I'm the Boy-Who-Lived!'."

Harry nodded tiredly, before hissing the transfiguration spell in parseltongue. He knew that with parseltongue, his disguise would last longer. At the same time his hair shimmered into dark sapphire, he enchanted his eyes to swim with liquid mercury at the same time; just slightly more prominent, but with the green dominant over all. He would never erase his parents' looks from himself.

"And your name will continue to be James, I'm guessing? Would you like to change your last name from Trace, though? Trace is such a muggleborn name." Harry rolled his eyes, "and as a Magi Kitsune, you are meant to have ancient roots."

Harry drawled sarcastically, "You make me feel so old." But he took into account what his old professor had said, and nodded. "James Ilnoches, then. For my Magi Blood."

Severus nodded. "Good. Will you be heading back to your place now?"

Harry muttered his agreement. "Yes, Sev. Will you be coming?"

"No, I better not. I have a staff meeting at Hogwarts, called by the old coot, soon."

The teen grinned up at the older man. "Have fun, Sevvy."

And then he poofed from existence, his hand holding onto his new clothes and portkey tightly before the irate potions professor could wring his neck.

.o.

He was seated awkwardly on his leather couch, with his clothes neatly folded into his cavernous luggage – he mentally reminded himself to buy a new one. His current one wasn't properly made, since it had been his first time blood charming one. He had nothing on his lap apart from his letters and a class of water, which he took a sip from.

A quick tempus charm allowed him the knowledge that he still had a short while to wait.

As the youth tapped his fingers against his glass of water, he was utterly blind to the shadow that was watching and smirking at him.

.o.

In his eyes, the youth was a female. Plain out and simple. However due to the letter his boss, the Headmistress, had sent to him, he knew his musings were wrong. The teen had long, dark blue hair – like the deepest depths of the ocean. It was a beautiful hue, yet what captured the Shadow Demons attention were those _eyes_.

They whirled like the sky on a stormy day, full of hidden sadness and pain – bitterness from betrayal, perhaps? Yet at the same time they held such a sunny disposition; full of unbending emotion and courage, a will and a fire to never conform to someone else's will. Never had he seen such emotion-filled eyes – or eyes which held such free spirit. He swore he had never seen such sparkling, emerald eyes before; such a beautiful shade, and nor would he ever want to. He needed no other eyes but those.

But he knew that _he_ was the teacher. He was the older, the more mature. And thus, he did what his kind were excellent at doing.

He slammed up his blank, emotionless mask; ready to face the siren.

Swiftly and silently, he glided across the shadows to the ones just behind the couch, slowly appearing like the sun behind a cloud. Except in a much more, non-cliché way. After all, he needed to keep his manly pride intact – something which was falling to shreds rather quickly as he stared openly at the male before him.

Damnit all to hell and back, he was meant to be the one intimidating the youth, not the other way round.

Unbeknownst to him, the thought that he was _very intimidating_ was running through the smaller bodied mans' mind.

.o.

Harry squealed in a manly way, half jumping out of his seat in fright as a man seemed to dissolve right into his vision. He was of an imposing height, six foot three, towering over his seated body. The man was glaring at him – Harry had no idea why. Sure, he might have pierced the man's eardrums, but that was the man's own bloody fault for scaring him.

"James Ilnoches?" asked the shadow calmly. He had dark, fiery cerise hair that ended before his collar – not long enough to be tied up. His eyes were like two chips of the night, jet black onyx, with an unreadable emotion in them.

"Y-Yes?" Mentally Harry slapped himself.

"I was assigned to ensure your safety and to help you buy your needed belongings for Nueva Academy." As though it was an afterthought, he added in some more. "My name is Xavier Varberhn. I teach Ancient Runes at Nueva."

"W-What are you?" jumbled out Harry, before he regained his senses. He blushed brightly as he realised how rude that must have sounded. He was already apologising before he could even gather his already-broken, train of thoughts. "I-I'm sorry, I-I didn't mean to be rude."

Okay. Harry really couldn't understand why he was stuttering like a school girl with a fangirl crush. This just _wasn't_ him. Unfeigned fury at the thought that he was acting just like Ginny rushed through him. Hell no. Like hell he'd act like that bint.

His eyes flashed with a determination that made the man beside him purr with delight – not that the object of desire of the demon noticed, being too caught up with his anger, and stepped closer.

The Shadow Demon had given up on his quest to stay away from the boy. The fury that rolled of 'James Ilnoches' in waves were enticing and arousing, and he found himself unable to stay away; he shivered in delight as he smelt the boy - the boy smelt like the ocean breeze, mixed with the soft scent of lilac. He took one last sniff before drawing back, watching emotions flash like a video on playback, across his face.

"I'm a Shadow Demon."

At least that seemed to garner some attention.

"L-Lovely" Inwardly he himself, laughed at his response.

"Come, Mister Ilnoches. We must buy your things before sundown and leave for Nueva."

The sixteen year old suddenly found his wrist encompassed in a warm hand, and tugged along. He had no time to process anything as he found himself in a swirl of darkness – and then an alleyway.

"We are on an island off the coast of Italy, created and used purely for magical beings. We use it for trading; and you can buy and sell almost anything here. It is much like that place in Britain – Diagon Alley, I believe the name is, except with no 'dark and light' rulings and prejudices." He smirked knowingly at Harry's frozen body, before pulling him out of the alley and onto a normal, cobbled archway. "You have a British accent, James. It is rather obvious—let's go that way." And off they went, his new professor still holding his arm.

As they passed by bustling crowds filled with Witches and Wizards dressed in muggle clothing, Harry looked around in enraptured delight. No one recognised him, and he could just freely relax. The island wasn't cramped or small like Diagon Alley was, in fact, it was the total opposite; with wide pathways and water features at each corner, multiple stories of stores blindsiding his vision on his left; yet on his right he could see the ocean.

Brilliant aqua, lapping at the white washed stones of the buildings; rays of sunlight skimming over the tips of the waves, and Harry found himself staring at the rainbows for a while.

The stores around him were aptly named and easy to decipher what was what. _Lolita's Lollies –_ sweets and such, _Wickham and Whilton's Weaponry –_ weapons and the like, and much, much more. There were random bridges that ran parallel to the ground in the air, themselves connecting the top level shops with the ones on the opposite side. As he looked up, he could see a crowd the similar size of the one below, actively moving around.

He barely processed what was going on around him when he was lead up a flight of stairs and into a musky shop, the smell of old and new parchments and books filling his nostrils. Harry found himself enamoured by rows and rows of books, and set to work finding some of the books he hadn't already found in one of his vaults.

Luckily for him, the Goblins had given him a handy enchantment that was used like an index, showing him what books he held in his luggage in alphabetical order, or organised by subject. In fact, he had many options to choose from, and even a more detailed search where he could look up by author or year of publishment.

"What books do you need?" His might-be professor, Xavier Varberhn, stood a hairs width behind him. He squeaked softly, flattening himself to the books. He didn't see the dark quirk of lips aimed at his behind.

"U-Uhm, just the book for Charms class; I already have all the other books." He was studiously looking at random books now, finding them distinctly more interesting than he had a second earlier. "Spelling your way to flying pigs, by Mythica Propogazne, I think."

Xavier leered at the teens back one last time before walking off to find the book for his little submissive. Sometimes he just wished the teen saw how he looked at him. He could only imagine the look that would be on his student's face as the boy finally noticed the dark, heavy desire in his lidded eyes.

James let out a pent up breath as the realisation that the man who caused his nerves to stand on end had finally left. He was wandering down the aisles of bookshelves when he stumbled across one titled _The Entities Magi Kitsune_, and then another beneath it, _Paraselenic._ He gripped them tightly, smiling secretly to himself. Maybe today was his lucky day.

After his almost-two years in prison, he'd found that he truly loved reading. It calmed him down some, took up time and fed him with information. As well as that, it never lied to him. Making his way to the counter, he found Xavier watching him. Harry rushed over to the man, his two books tucked firmly under his arm.

"I have your book," Harry turned to find that the man, had indeed, searched for the book for him. He grinned thankfully at the man; a slow, lopsided smile. "Are you also buying those two?"

Harry's gaze was turned down towards the books in his arms, and he nodded cheerfully. "Yep," he chirped, "I'll go line up now."

.o.

Harry soon found himself with a new seven compartment case which was multi-dimensional, much like his own. He would have to use a similar rune to the one he had on his own luggage case once he got to Nueva. He preferred having the case invisible to prying eyes and concealed in another dimension. In the case he had already stored away his potions material on one level, books onto the shelves in another, and some more clothing and robes in a third.

His eyes lit up like a kid in a candy shop as he noticed the Magical Creatures Pets Emporium diagonal to them. He raced over there, barely aware of the man hot on his heels, or the crowds of muggle-dressed-wizards-and-witches. His back was against the door as he stared avidly at all the creatures around him.

Twisting around to Xavier, he grinned brightly. "How many familiars are we allowed at Nueva, Sir?"

"Three, unless you get extra permission from the headmistress, or a logical reason as to why you should be allowed another." The man was also looking around the shop in interest, gazing in particular at the same one his charge was watching. It had a rich, golden pelt with forest brown splotches - a fluffy baby ocelot. It was draped casually over a rock, its paws curled beneath its neck as it slept, eyes shut and mouth slightly open.

"It's so cute," whispered Harry, his fingers tracing the shape on the outside of the glass cage. He whirled around to the shop keeper, before biting his lip. Perhaps he'd better check around a bit more. He sorely missed Hedwig, and wondered what had become of her. She had been left in the care of Fred and George…but knowing Ron, the git had probably strangled—no, he refused to think like that. At the same time, he decided to only get two familiars, as he held hope that she would come back.

His gaze was led to the back of the room, where he smiled softly. Snakes. He rather liked them, especially since he could converse with them.

"Could I be of assistance?" Behind Harry was an elderly man garbed in wizard robes. He held a cane in his left hand as he smiled at the youth.

"Uhm, yes, please. I was wondering if you have any rare or exotic snakes that I could purchase," He looked hopefully at the elderly man who smiled widely at his earnest face.

"Come along, I recently came to acquire a rare, Indigo Eastern Shieldtail – it's a hybrid of the iridescent shieldtail, and the indigo eastern rat snake." They were making their way down towards a back room, where the man pulled off a tarpaulin sheet. "Regretfully I cannot advise that you buy it. Not only is its venom deadly, its muscles are thick and tough enough to choke even the strongest of men. Giving this to a child…" the man shook his head wearily, "is a sin I just cannot do."

Making his way past the man, Harry ignored his protests as he gazed into the icy chips of the snakes' eyes.

'_Yess human child, come closser, I will bite you into the next century.' _The jet black snake reared its head back and forth, readying itself for its prey.

'_You will not eat me,'_ Hissed Harry, face in front of the snake; much to the shopkeeper's horror and Shadow Demon's intrigue.

'_A sspeaker, are you not?' _Slithering closer, the snake looked the human watchfully. _'I am Cielo. Take me with you, sspeaker. I will keep you company.'_

"I'll be buying this snake if you don't mind, sir."

"Lad," the man seemed to be having a fit of some sort, "are you perfectly sure you can handle this? I—" he was rudely cut off by Xavier, who placed a calming hand on his arm. If the demon noticed how the man jumped away, he didn't show it.

"I am positive that James will be more than capable with this snake. James, if you would go to the cashier and pay?"

Harry swiftly turned on his heel, the snake's cages handle grasped firmly in his hand as he made his way to the register. Along the way he picked up a few frozen mice, a glass emporium which he shrunk down for easier movability and some terrain.

Heaving the lot of things to the counter, he paused as he noticed the baby ocelot was now gone. He felt a slight pang, knowing that he wouldn't be the one cuddling it at night, but dismissed it. He was still deep in his thoughts and absolutely unready for the loud shriek that pierced his ears. Withdrawn from his musings, he could only stare at the girl who was holding a hand over her mouth, eyes wide with terror and disgust.

"Y-You're actually buying that scum?" Harry bristled, emerald orbs narrowing in anger. "Are you an idiot? It could kill you! And we all know that snakes are evil, Salazar—" a hand clamped down roughly on her mouth – Harry's hand. His eyes were blazing with anger, and he had to clamp a firm lid down on his temper.

"I don't know what issue you have against snakes, but speak to me like that one more time…" he trailed off, more than certain she had gotten his point, if the shaking of her shoulders was any inclination.

"T-Two hundred and th-three galleons, sir."

Harry reversed back to his casual self at the pure terror she showed. He couldn't help it though. After Azkaban, he had left with a shorter temper that needed to be slowly leaked out, or else he'd blow up in a mad frenzy. _Really_, he thought to himself, _I must find a stress-relieving hobby. Lucky I'm taking brawling, huh._

Snake cage under his arm, glass emporium and terrain in his luggage, along with the other necessities, Harry strolled out the door without a backward glance. He wasn't ready to deal with the side-effects of his anger just yet.

As soon as he was out the door, he set down the cage as he awaited his mentor. Unlocking the cage he pushed the cage door open, and pulled out his snake, Cielo.

'_Masster, why have we sstopped moving? Are we waiting for some deliciouss prey?'_

Harry chucked at her, his hand sliding underneath her body as she wound herself casually around the back of his neck.

'_I'm afraid not, Cielo. We are waiting for my companion. And no,' _he answered her unsaid question; '_you may not bite him or have a taste.'_

She looked rather put off at that, and began demanding for mice once they got back. _'Lots and lots of mice, master. I wish to be fed until you can only move me through brute force.'_

'_Ah,'_ Harry ticked her body as he let her wind around his arm. She was of a good length, about a metre, and very light. Her body was thin, yet he could feel it was of pure muscle. '_But who would mate with you then? I would not think that they'd want a mate they had to roll to their date.'_

He received a dark hiss at that.

'_If you were not my master, I would be biting you until you turned a marvellous sshade of puce.'_

Never had Harry been so thankful to be a parselmouth. '_Call me Harry, Cielo. You are my familiar, not my pet.' _

If a snake could look haughty, Cielo had it down to pat. '_It would not be any other way, you fool.' _He snickered.

'_Someone's feeling touchy.' _He switched subjects before she could change her mind about not biting her 'master'. _'You _are_ female, right?'_

'_Yes, master. No, I will not call you anything else. Calling you Harry soundss weird. It just does not fit in our relationship. However if you wish, you may call me your majesty. I rather like that,' _she seemed to hum to herself_. 'Yess, I rather like that.'_

Their chatter was stopped as Harry's world spun and he found himself on his ass; Cielo hissing dangerously at the cause of her master being bowled over. It was the small animal that he had fallen in love with earlier – the baby ocelot. It was licking his neck with little kittenish suckles, the small, purring body atop Harry's body, as though the lad himself were its bed.

Cielo didn't seem to take too kindly to that. She hissed darkly at the ocelot, her eyes as hard as flint as she poised herself to strike the small creature to its grave.

"No! I mean," '_No, Cielo, stop! It didn't hurt me or anything!' _In his haste to stop his familiar, he had almost forgotten to speak in her tongue. Silly him.

'_Foolish human, it is not that fact that he was going to harm you, but the fact,' _she was still hissing angrily at the ocelot, who looked at the snake through curious, shiny eyes. It placed a tentative paw in front of the other, nearing the coiled snake with curiosity. Inwardly Harry groaned. Just what he needed on his hands; a baby ocelot that didn't understand it would end up as snake food if it didn't back away soon. '_That he is on _my_ master. Harry!' _The teen couldn't help the chuckle that phased through his lips. His familiar was jealous? Funny that, as well as the fact that his snake had finally called him by his name. '_Thiss iss not funny. That mutt better get off of you before I make it.'_

Scrambling quickly to gently push the young ocelot off him, he could feel his heart clench at the broken, pleading look the small body gave him. That piteous, cute, heart-wrecking look moved his body on instinct, his arms coming out to wrap around the quivering body. As soon as he had the ocelot in his arms, Cielo was glaring at him with anger, whereas the ocelot on the other hand looked smug.

"I see that he has already claimed you," he jumped as the husky voice brushed over his ear, an unwanted shiver racing down his spine. "I am surprised that they have both taken to you so quickly. Usually ocelots are the fieriest and most distrustful creatures to walk through the doors of this island, and that is saying something."

Harry nodded half-heartedly. "Well, he's not mine. I only bought Cielo, here. I guess we had better take him back to the shop." His eyes drooped sadly at the thought, as he absentmindedly stroked his hand through the animals golden fur. The body rumbled and purred at the action, and the ocelot looked up at him through large, jade eyes – a lighter hue of his own colour, much like a brilliant shade of beryl.

The silence drew on for a couple more seconds before the teacher took pity on him, handing him some frozen rabbits and bedding. "He's yours now."

Sparkly emerald eyes locked onto obsidian orbs. Before Harry understood what he was doing, he had thrown himself into the demons arms, his hands tangling in the mess of crimson strands and tugging them lightly. "Thank you! Thank you so much!" Pure happiness radiated infectiously from his eyes, and the demon growled deeply, his control strained as he held himself from jumping those delicious bones before him and marking that perfect, porcelain skin.

"James," Harry paid barely any attention to the demon, his mind frozen as he tried to comprehend what to do. Move? Jump away apologising? Scream and run—"you might want to pick up your familiar who is trying to eat your baby."

Immediately Xavier found himself missing the warmth, a leer making its way onto his face as he found his soon-to-be-mate on his hands and knees, trying to pull the snake away from strangling the mewling ocelot.

"My baby! Cielo, stop!"

It occurred to Harry that Xavier hadn't condemned him for being able to speak in the language of snakes, or laughed that he called the ocelot his baby. He glanced up at the demon, his arms wrapped firmly around a writhing snake. What he saw on the demons face had shivers of anticipation racing through him.

He tore his gaze away from the demon awkwardly, a feeling of neediness rushing through him followed by dizziness. He stumbled from his awkward position on hands and elbows – hands wrapped around the snake in mid-air, and fell forwards; back arched, ass – which he currently didn't realise, poised delightfully in the air and shirt riding up slightly.

It took all the demons self-control to not just _ravage_ that perfect body before him. He pushed his mind to other thoughts, such as why such a small human could elicit such emotions from him. Never before had he experienced such temptation.

"Are you a siren?" – was the more than articulate question he found himself asking the boy that was still on his knees. As though Merlin himself hated him, the boy had spun around on his knees, so that he was kneeling whilst facing the demon. With his head between the said demons legs.

A feral look of need flashed through his eyes, before he gripped his mentality tightly and shoved away those thoughts and the like. He almost moaned though, when that small head of sapphire locks tilted slightly to the side.

"No?" a lopsided, curious smile graced the angels face. "I'm a Magi Kitsune."

_Delightful_. A wild grin graced Xavier's face as he quickly spun away from the raven haired teen and grabbed the suitcase.

"I'm assuming you aren't in need of a wand then?" At Harry's declination, the demon moved on. "We'll go to Penelope's Armoury; you'll be needing something flexible and durable – and also able to be worn at all times, during your stay at Nueva."

Harry was guided by Xavier who had his hand coincidentally on his shoulder, towards a shop with _Penelope's Armoury_ and a sword hanging off it as the title. A head from a door near the back of the shop popped into their eyesight, a brunette with attentive mocha eyes that were fixated on him, as though memorising ever contour of his body and how he moved.

"Xavier! You haven't visited in so long!" She smiled brightly at the man before pulling on Harry's arm. "I'm guessing this is the lad I'm going to be measuring?" She didn't wait for a reply, as she started tugging Harry's jacket and shirt off.

"What-hey!" He struggled briefly, glaring at the demon who smirked openly at him. "Xavier!" His pleas were ignored, as he found himself stripped down to his boxers. Then came the inevitable.

"I would prefer it if you took them off too." Harry's face took on a mortified blush which she giggled at. "But I won't force you to." The Shadow Demons face fell, but he kept his eyes glued to the lithe figure before him, whose blush had extended down to his neck.

Measuring tapes of all lengths and sizes rushed over at the flick of her wand, and she held out his arm with a muttered, "Hold still for a second, luv."

In a blur of quills scratching details onto some parchment, various different limbs being kidnapped and held in the air as it was measure, Harry felt rather…out of it.

Everything was a large blur. It felt just like yesterday he had been accosted in Azkaban, yet now here he was being fitted with armour. His brain was struggling to keep up with all these details. Now he was being hit with details and facts that he had tried to for so long, to keep buried. In fact, he had totally thought he was over the fact his best friend had shunned and helped with his imprisonment.

But then again, nothing ever seemed to go the way he wanted it to.

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><p><strong>Author's Notes: <strong>Woohoo. Yeah, so I know I didn't keep my 'update fortnightly' schedule. It's because my computer had a mental breakdown. I couldn't switch it on or anything! Some stupid NTRDL thing or something. Anyway, since my computer's halfway working now, I was able to quickly grab off my files and write on another computer. But yeah, didn't finish it until yesterday.

Oh! And have you guys checked out my other story? I'm so lucky that one had been on my usb beforehand. If you haven't, please check it out! It's for a prompt.


	4. Fighting a Lost Battle

**Warnings: **This will be male/male, slash! and het! Rating may or may not go up. It is OMC/Harry, Sirius/Remus, Lucius/Snape, Neville/Luna etc. Oh, Manipulative Dumbledore, and not-so-lovely-Weasley's, some may be nice, though.

**Disclaimer:** Check previous chapter.

Alright guys. Before we get into this, I will be addressing some issues which came up in my chapters, and some of the answers – although some will remain unanswered for the time being, as they will be answered in future chapters as part of the plot.

About Harry's hair, which turned from crimson to emerald then to blue – the emerald was a mistake. Ignore that, apologies on my part. I will be editing that out once I reach chapter ten. Er, well, once I get there. That's a bit into the future.

The rest of those issues are being worked on, and I am currently trying to make it so that they fit seamlessly into the plot. I really hope that by the time I'm done, you won't even be able to tell whether or it was planned.

Oh and uh, I scrapped the review idea. Because as much as I love getting reviews, I don't want reviews that are for the sake of making me write more. Anyhow, this chapter was way more than the twenty-something reviews dictated to top the five thousand. You might be wondering – how many words is this chapter? Well. The answer to that? Ten thousand and sixty-five. And counting. Hah.

This is once again, un-beta'd, and un-edited.

Well, apologies for the long ass note – let's get into the story, ey? Hitting chapter five, babes. Read onwards.

Chapter IV – Fighting a Lost Battle

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><p><em>Flashback<em>

It was pandemonium. Loud screams continuously raping his left ear, the side which Ginny stood there crying obscenities of how Harry had tried to rape her to keep silent about his attacking and almost murdering of Neville. Ron, the bastard of a redhead, was backing her up; his face flushed a similar red to his hair.

Her voice rang scratchily throughout the room. "Of course Potter tried to murder Neville! Neville threatens everything Potter is!" It struck Harry that he was now 'Potter'. "If Neville turns out to be the actual Boy-Who-Lived, Potter would be living in tatters! Harry realised this, and he saw that Neville was starting to get more attention, that's why he tried to kill him, Potter is scum!"

_Untrue, those filthy liars. Neville and I were best mates. Even closer than Ron and I were._

Sirius leapt to his feet a split second after Remus, one of his hands pointing at her. He glared at her in disgust, utter loathing apparent in his eyes.

"Don't be ridiculous, Ginerva Weasley." Sirius watched with unconcealed satisfaction at the anger her name drew. "Harry is rich enough on his own, and anyone that has ever spent even a second with Harry knows that he doesn't like the fame. In fact," his voice grew louder in the now silent hall, "Harry would actually love to not have all of these responsibilities on him! You of all people should know that!"

The boy who was being spoken about just sat there, face completely devoid of emotion. He was drained. Day after day of all of this fighting; he felt like it would never end. All he wanted was some peace. He had fought and partaken in the war. He had tried his very best every single year. And he had even saved that….that _witches_ life – and this was how she repaid him? By calling him scum, and crying out scathing lies against him? By betraying him, just because _she _thought that Neville was now the Boy-Who-Lived?

He was disgusted when he fully understood why she was so intent on creating lies to 'support' Neville. It was to get on the comatose-induced-boys' side. She wanted to get rid of him, so that when Neville was back and alive, she could act as a godsend, taking care of his every whim and having been the one who drove Harry, the now pronounced (in her head), Fake-Boy-Who-Lived, away.

She was twisted and he wanted nothing more than to see her face when she realised the implications and repercussions of her actions.

"Look at him! He's so blank, it's only because he knows that this is all true! He hasn't even defended himself once," she spat at the judge, who sat there smirking viciously.

He too, was on the Weaslette's side. He had never liked the teen who had all the fame. More fame than a teenager should have had.

"I must say," He drawled, "I agree quite fitfully with Miss Weasley's case. Mister Potter here has yet to say any words in his own defence."

Harry glanced up at the judge, his eyes carefully blank. He knew that no matter what he said, the judge would find a way to take it and twist it back on him. Hell, he knew that even Dumbledore was against him. Merlin, Dumbledore was the main cause of this whole mess in the first place! It was the old coot who had spread lies and paid Ron and Ginny to do this – to lie and hurt him in the worst way possible. Not only publicly, but also to barrage in on his private life and stir up trouble there, too.

"C'mon, mate. Just admit you did all of this," Ron's blue eyes bored into his, a malevolent gleam in them. Harry held back the tears that threatened to explode as his friend blatantly turned his back on him. "We all know how much you lusted after Ginny, even though she told you no."

He wanted to hurt them. Just as much as they had hurt him. Merlin forbid them from ever being in the same room as him again, with or without a wand. He would punch them the Muggle way. He needed no magical leverage to up them on that. His fury would lend him power.

"The turning point just happened to be Neville stealing everything away from you; it's alright, mate. Just accept and admit it – they'll even make the sentence for you shorter." Harry was beginning to shake. "You know we're best mates, right? I just want the best for—"

"Just shut up, Ron!"

Harry had been so ready, so ready to just blow up and hex his ex-friend into the next life. But the red head was lucky. His jaded eyes took in the sight before him with a pang of gratefulness, and what he later realised was love.

Hermione was standing up for him, her hands balled into fists as she glared furiously at Ron.

"Stop lying, Harry and Neville were closer friends than you and Harry had ever been!"

"Be quiet, Mudblood," hissed Ginny, temper rising as she had been so damn close to having Harry crack. "There is no avoiding this."

Harry knew she was right. Especially as the Judge smirked at him with that disgusting twinkle, an exact replica of Dumbledores', in his eyes.

"Attention!" The Judge rapped his hammer down onto the gravel harshly. "Due to the silence on Mister Potter's side and the grave facts and witnesses, I declare Harry James Potter, Son of the late Lord James Potter and Lily Potter nee Evans, guilty. He is sentenced to a minimum lock up in Azkaban of forty years for the alleged almost-raping of Ginerva Weasley, and attacking and almost murder of Neville Longbottom. He is hereby stripped of his status as a child, and all of his accounts frozen. Should Mister Longbottom decide after he awakens from his coma to sue Mister Potter for grief with compensation money, we will arrive back here another time. That is all. Guards, take away this…scum."

There was a loud din beginning to form, mutters turning into furtive whispers, which lead to the raising of voices – before screaming. Loud, horrendous, echoing wails, and in some cases, cheers.

Dumbledore came forwards before the crowd could leap out and protect or destroy Harry, and exclaimed, "Surely you have forgotten one thing, Judge Xullivan," at the Judge's conspiring grin, the First Class Chief Warlock continued, "we must first take care of the business of Mister Potter's wand."

"How right you are," nodded along the Judge. "I had nearly forgotten such an important procedure. Thank you, Albus. We will tend to that right away."

He picked up the holly wand between two fingers in distaste, before bringing it to the headmaster with undisclosed delight.

"Would you do the honours, Albus?"

Flashing a wolfish grin that went unnoticed to all but Harry and his horrified friends, the bearded man nodded. "I would be honoured, Judge Xullivan." And with a flourish, he gripped the two opposite ends of Harry's wand and smiled merrily at the boy, before exerting force and ever so slowly snapping it, savouring the sounds of the wood creaking and crying. "And now, to just make sure that it is all gone…_incendio._" The two pieces of the wand went up in flames to Harry's distress.

"Harry my boy, this is all for your own good. I hope you find it in yourself to forgive this old man when you are granted freedom."

His wand. _No_. This couldn't be happening.

Harry glared angrily, tears stinging his eyes. The bastard, putting on his air to the very end. He would damn well pay. He would definitely regret this. Harry would make sure of it.

Even as he was cuffed with magical blockers, he could only replay that scene in his eyes, over and over again. He barely noticed as the earlier bedlam came back in full force plus more, deafening a whole lot of people.

"No, Harry!" He blinked twice, before turning his head to face the voices that called for him. Sirius, Remus, Luna and Hermione. Luna's smile had faded for the first time since Harry had met her, and she was staring at him with intense grey eyes. He flinched. She meant a lot to him too, and if she turned against him…

"Harry, the Nargles say they want you to visit them later." Then she smiled. "Don't worry, Harry, Neville will clear all this up when he awakens." Harry couldn't help the relieved smiled that slipped through. It was a load off his mind to know that Luna believed him.

"Harry, oh, Harry," Hermione was crying, her eyes rimmed with crimson, and her hair puffier than ever. "I'm so sorry I couldn't do anything, Harry."

Awkwardly he looked at her from his captivities. "It's alright, 'Mione. I already knew that the Judge liked Ron and Ginny's story better." He shrugged.

"Pup," It was Remus and Sirius now, Sirius' face gaunt with bad memories. "You'll be out of there soon, just –" Harry was dragged off before they could finish, his guards holding their wands at his friends' faces.

"Back off. Mister Potter is coming with us." His guard sneered at them, before tugging ruthlessly at the chains that found Harry. "Move, Potter. We don't have all day."

And with that, Harry found himself dragged away, sharing a brief glance with a shadow who had bent down and picked up a faintly glowing phoenix feather.

The manacles on his wrist felt lighter.

.o.

"Mister Ilnoches? Earth to Mister Ilnoches!"

Harry was shaken from his walk in memory lane by an irate and worried face.

"Mister Ilnoches, please refrain from conking off in the middle of your fitting! I've been trying to get your attention for the last five minutes!"

Harry blushed. "Sorry, I was just caught up in some memories."

The fae's face softened some, before she lent down towards his confused face, her hand outstretched. She gently wiped away a tear that had trekked down his face with her thumb. "That's alright, Mister Ilnoches."

"James, please."

"James, then," she amended. "Now, as I have been asking—"

She was interrupted by Xavier who input snidely, "rather insistently," Harry chanced a glance over at the demon, a bit surprised to notice the worry that swam in those orbs.

"—what material would you prefer to have your body protection made out of?"

Harry glanced over the materials that she had hovering around them in interest. There were many different types, but he felt a subtle pull towards the left, where he ran his fingers over the material lightly. It was smooth and instantly heated up wherever he touched. Upon scrunching it slightly in the corner, he found it straightened back to flat after only a second.

He found he rather liked that.

He swung around to the seamstress, Penelope, with the material in hand, only to stop in hesitance. Both she and Xavier were watching him with barely concealed excitement and interest.

"Uhm," he paused. "Is something the matter?"

The two jumped into action, their stupor forgotten as they grinned brilliantly at him.

_How unsuspicious_, he thought drily to himself, before resigning himself to not knowing why.

"Y-No, everything's fine, James!" Penelope stepped forwards, eyeing the fabric in his hand before spinning her wand in a circle. "Good choice, James. This material is Thestral Skin lined with Acromantula Silk. It is highly durable and expands up to a certain extent as the user grows."

She began marking the material with odd crosses and lines, before smiling up at him. "As well as being able to withstand attacks from blades and so forth, it can absorb some minor and average hexes, as well as be worn beneath clothing at all time." Harry nodded along, furiously taking all of the information in. "A simple built in charm enables the wearer to decide if they want it to cool or heat up for them, and can be worn by itself…"

"However," she was bustling over to the door at the back now, calling out loudly for her cat. Harry didn't know why. "I suggest that you don't show this material to others. It's rather special."

At this, Harry jerked up, "What? No, I can't take it from you then!"

Her eyes danced with mirth. "Who said anything about taking? Of course you're going to pay!" Harry rolled his eyes. Oh, he definitely knew that was going to happen.

Shrugging he watched as she waved him off, stating a quick. "Come by in two hours. It should be ready by then." She glanced up. "You need full body armour, right? Anything special that I should be aware of?"

Harry mulled over this in his head for a second, before offering, "I have a tail."

She nodded sagely at that. "Yes, and a mighty fine tail it is, too." She waved happily at him as she got stuck into making his new clothing. "Pay me later; it should be about four hundred galleons!"

He grinned at her one last time before making his way out the door, Xavier right behind him.

They had walked along in awkward silence for a while, before Xavier finally spoke out. "Mind explaining what happened back there?"

The teen glared forwards at the pavement, his pace quickening slightly. "Actually, yeah, I do mind."

"It wasn't a yes or no question, James. You will explain to me what—" Harry interrupted him before he could get any further.

"No, I won't!" He'd had enough of those annoying dictators in his life. The Dursley's, Dumbles, Ginny, Cho Chang. The list went on and on. "You can't tell me what to do!"

"I can," replied the demon evenly, his gaze hard and unflinching.

"No," snarled Harry, "you damn well can't. You don't mean anything to me—" a pained cry tore itself from his lips as he found himself pinned ruthlessly to the side of a building. His gaze searched around frantically, only to find that they were in an empty alley. When they had stopped being mulled by other people he had no idea.

He was held uncomfortably against cold bricks.

Twin arms caged him to the wall, and he found himself dwarfed by the imposing height of the male before him. The warm body of the demon pressed heavily down against him, and he hated the fact that he couldn't move.

"You belong to me," hissed the demon possessively, obsidian eyes locked on rebellious green.

The teen writhed angrily from beneath the larger form, glaring at the demon all the while. "Let me go, you git! I don't belong to you; in fact, I don't belong to anyone!"

His rant was brought to a stop, his eyes flashing large and doe-eyed as a pair of chapped, firm lips neared his own. It was only his reflexes honed by his years of a Seeker that enabled him to turn his head at the last second - the lips which had almost touched his own now on his neck.

And he realise what a bad, bad mistake he'd made.

A fiendish gleam entered the demons eyes as his mouth roved over the expanse of skin, nipping and sucking at random intervals to the Kitsune's distress.

"Varberhrn, stop it!" he bat uselessly at the firm body above his, "Varber—ahh," the demon started sucking harshly at the junction where his shoulder and neck met before sinking his fangs in deeply and piercing the skin, drawing blood. A keening wail erupting from the submissive, as the demon finished marking him, slowly licking back and forth with his tongue, lapping up the blood.

Obsidian eyes glimmered as the man pulled back slowly, watching as his work of art blossomed beautifully against that once unmarked skin.

Harry jerked away from the Shadow Demon, a furious glare on his face. His feet were a tad unsteady, but he hid it behind his wall of fury. "What the hell was that for?" He threw his hands up in the air at the blank face his might-be-teacher supplied him with. "You know what? It doesn't even matter, it won't happen ever again, anyway."

Wisely the crimson haired man kept his mouth shut, allowing the young teen to carry on with his ranting. He knew rather clearly that it was not the last mark the Kitsune would receive. Far from it, in fact.

Pushing back his bangs so that they didn't cover his eyes, he didn't miss the blush that covered the Kitsune's face. Smirking, he followed the still blushing teen onto the bustling streets. He watched as the teen fumbled around, silently assessing if there was anything else he needed.

"You need weapons," drawled the voice from behind Harry, who spun around to glare heavily at the demon.

"You know what? I don't care!"

But despite the fact he yelled that in the demons face, the demon took it all in stride, yanking the smaller male behind him as they travelled down a staircase into an underground room tagged with '_Wickham and Whilton's Weaponry'._ As they walked down the stairs smoothly, or in Harry's case, bumbled down, they passed by an array of different weapons and shield defence metal ornaments – in other words, things Harry had no idea the name of.

Harry's eyes flicked over the different types as they reached the end of the stairs. Around the large, dark room were different categories. Each aisle held a wooden board that hung down from two chains, stating what type of weapon it was. The amount of wooden titles went on for as far as his eye could see, and he recognised few of them.

Silver lances, iron torques, battle axes, tempered katanas, whip duel swords, crossbows, bowguns and so many more.

He looked around amazed.

"Oi," Harry jolted as Xavier yelled out, banging his fist against the wall, sending a wave of dust flying around. "Superbi, get your ass over here!"

There was a crash, the sound of metal screeching and a loud "Holy—ow!" And then a messy mop of dirty blond hair appeared. "Xav, I haven't seen you in years!" A baby blue eye closed as the man wiped his hair frantically, attempting to rid himself of the dust. "Just give me a second here."

Harry took note of the man's clothing with interest. He wore a pair of tatty jeans, styled with rips along the knees and a rip on the thigh. It was sky blue, and held a chain that hung off the sides. His shirt was a plain charcoal grey, with the neck in the shave of a 'V'. It was splattered randomly with paint; bright orange, vivid turquoise and hazy yellow.

"I've been a little busy with some trouble students," the demon inclined his head slightly. "Right now I'm here for James. He needs a weapon, and hasn't ever fought before."

Harry glared at the demon, his mouth opening to retort.

"And don't bother lying, James."

Pouting, the Kitsune visibly turned away from the demon to the demons displeasure, yet shop keepers glee.

"Finally, a person that can keep Xav on his toes." He stuck his hand out to the raven haired lad with a large grin on his face. "Hullo, I'm Sanders," he pulled a funny face, "but call me Superbi. Most do, anyhow."

Taking the hand gingerly, Harry found himself pulled to smile back. "James. It's nice to meet you, Superbi."

As their hands pulled away, Sanders began to clap his hands together in delight. "So, you say you have no preference to any weapons? I have free reign?"

"Yeah," Harry found himself being led over to a clear area, with boxes on the side housing various swords and such.

"Awesome! It's been years since I was able to test out weapons." He rolled his eyes at Xavier in particular, "some people are such stubborn old farts. They won't touch any other type of weapon that deviates from their own."

Snickering at the annoyed grimace on the demons face, Harry nodded. "Yeah, I had the feeling that you had buyers that were like that."

Xavier grunted, aware that any response would be used against him.

"Catch, James."

Fumbling to catch the flying projectile, he squeaked. Looking at it, Harry found it to be weird; sure, he hadn't seen a lot of weapons in his time, but this weapon seemed strangely different. Not to mention it weighed a bloody tonne – which explained the masculine noise he had earlier uttered. He had to use both hands just to stabilise it as he stabbed the point into the ground.

"Uh," he intoned casually. "What the hell is this?"

He was somewhat right in asking this question, as it was an odd specimen. Crafted using bronze and titanium, it was rather heavy and bulky. It was like a fork at one end and a sword at the other, the handle of it flat like a paddle in the middle.

Definitely odd. He didn't bother silencing his thoughts, uttering them out loud to the amusement of Xavier.

"I told you," commented the demon, watching as his mate struggled with the heavy weapon, "it's too big for those under six foot at the _minimum._"

Glaring, Harry whipped around to the demon. "And I suppose you think you're strong enough to wield this easily, then?"

"Of course, I _am_ a demon after all." The demon shrugged easily, muscles rippling in a fluid motion.

"Then you take it!" Snarling, Harry half threw, half dropped the weapon into the waiting hand of the demon, who stared at the weapon in surprise.

"Superbi, you might want to change the metal used in this. It is rather heavy." At Harry's smug look, the demon lifted the weapon over his head easily and threw it with enough force to impale it deep into the cemented wall, on the opposite side of the room to them. Which was about twenty meters away, give or take.

He had officially wiped away the smug smirk that had adorned Harry's face just seconds ago.

"Well," huffed Harry, "not all of us can be muscle bona-fide demons." His insult at being demonic went unnoticed, as Xavier mused; he _was _a demon after all. And he did have a small little mate to look after. It explained their differences.

Again Harry was chucked another weapon, this time, a katana. It felt rather comfortable in his hand, and it was a pretty good weight. Hefting it he flicked it up and down. He rather liked it.

"Hmm," Sanders was watching him through calculative blue eyes, "Put that one aside, we'll try some more."

Almost despondently, Harry placed the weapon next to Xavier.

This time he was handed three daggers sheathed firmly in leather. Slowly edging one out, he spun it slightly in a clumsy motion, before throwing it at the wall like a dart. He narrowly missed a hissing demon, who glared half-heartedly –hey you couldn't blame him, with his mate looking at him with that shy, embarrassed blush – at him whilst holding the dagger between two fingers.

"Watch where you're throwing it, I don't really want to have to visit the nurse. She dislikes me enough as it is."

Harry looked on discomfited, before slowly nodding his head in agreement.

"I guess daggers aren't your forte, huh kiddo? Heh." Sanders blatantly ignored the glare tossed his way. "Ever swung a glaive?" He spun around with a wicked grin, "They're the best for stabbing those pig-sucking scumbags, here, have a swing."

Almost as soon as Harry had grabbed it, the weapon was pulled out of his hand.

"Actually no, your hand span is a bit too small." He dodged the angry sheath that came speeding his way. "Hm, I guess I'll have to do you the manual way."

Harry pretended not to notice the innuendo, but it seemed that the demon had no such qualms to do the same, as, over in the corner, the shadow hissed darkly at that. "_Watch it, Sanders_."

Grinning shamelessly, the weapon smith urged Harry over. "Both arms out; straight." Complying Harry raised his arms level with his shoulders. "Good, now don't drop this, and tell me when it starts to become heavy."

Carefully, Harry balanced the tray between his two hands, watching as the blond started pulling out various sized weights. Naturally, Harry thought he'd begin with the smallest. However, he was also learning to expect the unexpected with the people that sold items to Nueva students.

First came the largest of the lot.

He resisted the urge to shriek as his arms plummeted to the ground, himself jumping backwards to avoid a mishap with his toes being sliced off. He slammed into the wall behind him with a thump, and heard Sanders' cry of "whoa there!"

A loud crash a smash later, Harry peeked open an eye he hadn't realised he'd shut, only to stare at the amused faces of two very handsome men.

"What?" he cried defensively, "that thing was huge!"

Snorting, Sanders handed him the tray once again. "We'll start with the smaller weights this time, ey?"

Hands out, once again, Harry watched as the man started with the smallest weights and began to build up slowly, a large smirk gracing the others' clean-shaven face. Immediately, Harry knew that the man had done it on purpose, _the bastard_.

"Heavy," he murmured softly, intent on the weights being placed into his arms almost gently. Harry knew his eyes were closed. He knew, because he could feel them darkening behind his eyelids, the embers that could start a burning inferno flickering with temptation.

He heaved his chest beneath the tray, his muscles beginning to quake. His ears started to buzz, the sounds of a voice calling out "Get rid of the weights!" fading to white noise. He could sort of feel his body start to shake, and the tang of blood flitted past his tongue, and down his clenching throat.

His ears twitched frantically, tail straight as a ramrod. A flash of whiteness overtaking the darkness in his eyes, and he could feel his gums beginning to tighten, a searing burn on his shoulder beginning to take place.

A brief scream later, he felt fine.

Absolutely perfect, actually.

Too bad the shop around him wasn't.

Swords had been imbedded into the walls, staves and large, weird bladed things had followed. Nun-chucks, or what he thought they were, were righteously close to the demon's head, who was looking at him with an indiscernible glint in his eyes. Shelves were now floored – literally, and a silver powder of some kind was only just beginning to settle, causing poor ol' Harry to cough.

"Well, mate," Harry turned to see Sanders slapping Xavier over the back with a chuckle. "You're gonna have your hands full, eh?"

Harry, for the life of him, couldn't understand _why_. Sure Xavier was one of the teachers at his school, but that didn't necessarily mean that the guy was his teacher…right? He once again, could not decipher the look that the two then shared.

Oh, speaking of understanding and deciphering stuff – what the hell had just happened? It looked like a mini nuclear explosion had just taken place.

"Do you have anything you would like to say to us?" uttered the shadow demon clearly, as though he knew something that he thought Harry knew, and was waiting for the boy to own up.

"No," he replied snarkily, a glare on his face. "I have no bloody clue as to what just happened—" he ignored the twin, surprised looks the two shared, continuing his rant. "—so if you think you're getting any information, which might I add, I don't have, out of me, you can go shove that idea up your ass!"

He then proceeded to clamp a hand over his mouth, ears drooping downwards in his bout of upset. Jolting as a hand rubbed one of his furry ears softly, he looked up through his bangs.

"Calm down, kit."

Oh, so he was _kit _now_, _was he? He almost hissed at the name, before realizing it was the short version of Kitsune. He could live with it, then.

"The thing is," it was Sanders speaking now, a lollypop – when had that gotten that? in his mouth. "What just happened to you – you know, the whole shebang and boom thing, only happens when magical constraints fall off." Harry was eyed by the blond, who sucked harder on his sweet, a calculating look in his eye. "So what'd you get arrested for?"

Harry almost bolted the hell out of there. And he was going to, too, if it hadn't have been for the hand that was now gripping his shoulder tightly.

"James?"

"I—" he stopped himself, mouth clamping shut. He had been so close to losing it and saying that he wasn't James. His composure must have slipped a lot for that to have come so close to have being spat out. "I was…arrested before my inheritance, that is true…" his mind was churning a thousand creative fibs he could tell at once, and he found himself opening his mouth without his brain's consent. "But it was for a crime I did not commit, and I'm still sorta on the run."

_Sorta?_ – hah, he wished.

He scratched his head oddly and Sanders noticed the blond grinning delightfully.

"Oh, you broke out, did ya? Interesting. Maybe I'll try you out with…nah, that won't work. Or maybe it…" Sanders rambled off and Harry looked on as Xavier sighed.

"Superbi, just hurry the hell up, we have to pick up his armour from Penelope soon."

"Alright, alright Xav, don't get your nickers in a twist."

From the unimpressed look on the demon's face, the Muggle joke went unappreciated.

"H'okay, James, you could take up to thirty-three pounds, meaning that your weapon can't exceed ten if you want to wield it in a read battle that goes over fifteen minutes." Harry couldn't for the life of him tell if Sanders was talking to him, or at him.

"Have you got any natural affinities to any weapon types? Say leather or iron or something?"

Harry did rather like leather. But he needed a blade, too. He voiced out his thoughts, and was amused to find that Sanders then leapt over a large crate which had fallen during the earlier disruption, and was stumbling into the backroom. "Hang on!"

There was a seconds silence, punctuated only by the cries of ow's and 'damn that hurt!'.

The yell of, "I've got it!" reverberated throughout the room.

Harry turned back to the mess at hand – or at foot, depending on the viewer's point of view. Sighing, he swiped a hand over his forehead. He didn't notice the heavy gaze that was pinned on him.

"Can't leave a mess I made myself, can I?" he muttered lowly to himself, his magic already leaving his core and streaming through the palm of his hands. Slowly, everything began to rearrange themselves; shelves picking themselves up from the floor, and weapons re-hanging themselves on the walls.

Looks like he really didn't need a wand to do magic, huh. But still, it could be handy to have wandless magic as his hidden ace.

"Okay!" Harry was rather delighted at himself; he didn't flinch or look horrified at the glorified exuberance on the blond's face. "Here James, lookie here!"

Harry was damn well looking. It was a rather…well known item.

"Is that a…" he drawled off, before hitching right back onto his first line of thought. "Is that a _whip_?"

The look on Harry's face was far from appreciative, unlike Xavier's look of profound glee – which vanished immediately as the Kitsune turned his dark glare on him.

"Yes, it is!" Sander's didn't seem to see what the problem was. "But, it's a special whip."

"I see it," was the demon's helpful two cents.

"What," asked Harry blandly, a look of sarcasm and irony oozing from his features. "It spits out white goop?"

Xavier liked the sound of that.

"Close but no cigar."

It was odd that a magical being was using Muggle sayings. Harry didn't need to voice out his thoughts, though, as young Harry's face said it all. The man Sanders was an idiot – a loveable idiot, but an idiot all the same.

"No, seriously, it is special," insisted the man, all but shoving the whip into the boy's hands. "Here, just hold it!"

No, Harry thought tiredly, he just wanted a bloody bl—blade?

"What the hell?" He stared amazedly, for, in his hands, lo and behold, was a blade – sure, the whip was still there, but the long whippy bit was now coiled tightly around the handle, where on the opposite side of the whip side of the handle was an honest to goodness blade. A blade about eleven inches long, and deadly sharp.

It appeared to be more of a short sword, but a long dagger.

Harry didn't know whether the man was a genius, or just plain insane.

Xavier whistled lowly. "You've out done yourself this time, Sanders."

Sanders nodded brightly, before pushing at Harry and placing a piece of paper in front of him. "Go on, give it whip."

Sighing softly, Harry did just that; bringing back his wrist, followed by a quick flick forward. There was a loud _wa-cha,_ and Harry grinned, noticing that the paper in front of him was now sliced neatly in two.

He rubbed his chin genially, turning to Xavier.

"Can I just buy this one? We're tight on time, right? And I changed my mind; I want a wand too."

"A wand? Why? You're proficient enough with wandless." There was the unsaid 'for an ex-wizard', but Harry ignored that, forging on.

"A personal reason, you could say. So, let's go?"

Xavier seemed to look at him for a long moment, before nodding. It seemed he had found what he needed, on the boy's face. "Pay Superbi, then."

Harry was already talking to the blond before he'd finished, chattering away about prices.

"That'll be seventy-five galleons—" before he could pat the kid on the head, he was stopped harshly by another.

"There's something odd, here," mused the demon, as though he wasn't hold his friends' wrist in a death grip. "You've never sold anything to someone for less than two-fifty a piece. What's going on here, Sanders?"

And oh look, out came the demonic aura; pitch black and deadly. It seemed Xavier didn't like the thought of people playing around where it concerned his baby mate.

"I just like the kid—woah, hey!"

It also seemed as though that was the wrong way to tell the close to snarling demon that he just wanted to be _platonic_ friends.

"What did you just say, Sanders?"

Wisely, Sanders didn't repeat himself, instead waving off the taller man with a casual, 'who said what?' look.

"I'm just slightly fond of the kid." He carried on, ignoring the low growl that rumbled through the body opposite him. It occurred to him that his wrist was still being squished like jell-o. "And you know what I mean. I'm not stupid enough to get wound up in one of your fiascos."

Harry was watching the play before him avidly. It was interesting to see his teacher so ruffled and annoyed – he couldn't exactly tell why – nor why he was so annoyed at Sanders for making Xavier angry. Perhaps it had to do with school dignity and pride, and all the crap.

Slowly, too damn slowly, in Sanders' opinion, the grip slackened before pulling away entirely. The skin beneath where the fingers had once been was now laden with red, heavy imprints, born from the imposing man's hand. At least he now knew to never, ever flirt with a shadow demons - potential or not, mate.

"Harry," said boy jumped to attention, to the amusement of the other occupant of the room, "pay Sanders, now."

Sanders sighed mentally. It seemed the demon was sulking and still pissed at him. He had the feeling that it would take quite a lot of effort to get back into his good graces. Damn demons and their penchant for grudges.

After the young fox had paid him and had begun heading out the door right behind Xavier, Sanders bolted forwards, chucking something at Harry, who, with his years of playing Quidditch, caught it with practiced ease.

"Eh, Superbi?" Thank Morgana, at least someone was still calling him that. "What's this for?"

"A gift," called Sanders, before quickly doing the only thing he knew that would stop the teen from returning his gift to him. He shut the door on the others' face.

A look of complete indignation and a squawk later, Harry seemed to finally register what had happened. However, it seemed his mouth was stuck on saying a single syllable sentence.

"Eh?"

It seemed, actually, that his brain had not yet caught up with reality. Dumbly, almost, he turned to Xavier.

"What the hell just happened?"

He got a shrug in response, Xavier's arm draping around his shoulder as he steered the younger towards where the wand maker's shop was.

"It doesn't matter. Sanders has always been a little offbeat."

They made their way up long, stairwells that moved – escalators, Harry thought, to get the second floor. He hadn't used one in years and that the last time been back in the Muggle world. What in Merlin's name was the magical folk here using it for? Most non-Muggle's strongly disliked using anything distinctly non-magical.

"I told you," commented Xavier, "we're not like you Britt's. For us, we're much like the saying – what is it? Something like, 'if the shoe fits, wear it'.

Harry glared hotly at the demon. "We're not that bad." At the pointed look her received, he relented. "Maybe we're a little behind in stuff, and totally hate the Muggles – don't look at me, it wasn't my fault! – and sure, we're into quills and feathers instead've pens and send owls in times where a phone call would be much more efficient. But—" he stopped short. "Damn. We suck."

Xavier nodded expectantly. "I know."

"Well you didn't have to say it so bluntly," snapped Harry. "That's just rude. You don't see me pointing out how bad mannered you are, and sexually frustrated—mmph!" He found himself cut short as a hand covered his mouth. He peered over it nervously.

There seemed to be a dark, incredulous look on the demon's face, as he stared at Harry stunned.

"You think I'm _what_?"

Harry also, like Sanders, had better sense than to repeat what he thought.

"You know," began the demon conversationally, "I find it rather irritating when people—" he had no chance to finish, as they reached the level above them.

Once again, Harry was stumped as he looked around.

The second floor had just as many people walking through its pathways – or maybe they should be called streets, as they were broad enough for two carriages, or cars, abreast. Their clothes were vibrant and full of life, and it was so unlike Britain that Harry was constantly awoken to the fact that he was not in Britain any longer. He could no longer walk down Diagon Alley, for fear of being noticed and re-jailed.

The journey down nostalgia lane was broken, as something zoomed past him.

A snitch.

"Whoa!" he was yanked to the side heavily and only noticed then that the path before him had parted like the red sea. He then understood why.

Right on the snitches heels, was a broom. And on that broom, was a person. And then, on that person's broom – or heel, was a bludger and the larger figure of a Beater behind him.

"Nargles for the win!"

"What the hell? You're kidding! Go the Harpies!"

Harry could see in the crowd before him that a large fight was beginning to start. Almost after those two, simple lines had been said, a crowd had gathered – that is, some behind the lady who had screeched for the Nargles, and the other half behind the fiery carrot topped man, who had rebutted with the Harpies comment.

He turned intrigued, to Xavier; who had watched the boy's eyes light up like Christmas when the Quidditch match had passed by them.

Harry's hopes were fulfilled as the demon complied with an explanation.

"This whole island we're standing on is the Quidditch grounds. On either ends of it, are the usual goals. Unlike the usual British version – we play like the Americans. With bigger field grounds, smaller hoops, and less rules. It's like your version basically, but with more aggression and passion."

"Isn't that bad though?" asked Harry confusedly.

Naturally, people that got aggressive and passionate tended to be the ones that started brawling for no reason. Call him cliché and judgemental – but this was what he had been brought up around.

"It is not good to make assumptions like that, James." Harry winced. He could almost taste the lecture he was about to get – and he wasn't even on school grounds yet.

"Well you're obviously as blind as a bat, you witch!"

– Harry didn't know whether the man meant it literally or not, and tried to focus back on the demon's words. The demon had merely ignored the screaming and was continuing on with his lecture.

"We here on Elsaphya get along well. Apart from screaming matches at Quidditch games and sometimes small spats, we work well together. We coexist in harmony – we have enough enemies, you know, without the added amount in here."

Elsaphya. So that was the name of the island.

The shadow demon gestured around at the people casually. The Quidditch match had ended as the Seeker had attempted to reach the snitch; only to have a bludger smash into his back. He had free fallen until he was a meter or two from turning into spaghetti – only to have his arm caught in a tight hold.

"You alright, Lex?" it was the Beater, his face concerned as he held the other in the air. Harry whistled, the dude had to be strong to be able to hold onto the guy with one arm – and keep himself _and_ the other airborne.

"Thanks, Miles!"

Miles gently placed the wiry figure of the Seeker onto the first level cobbled flooring.

The Seeker, Lex, grinned easily. "Thought I was a goner, I did. Saw the ground rushin' towards my face. Thanks again, Miles."

Miles, it seemed, looked stressed.

"You idiot! Don't reach down at such high speeds – Merlin, think about your life, for once! I won't always be around to save you."

Lex glared heatedly, his good mood fading. "I didn't ask you to save me, you know." It seemed he was a sort of wolf-hybrid, as cobalt, furry ears poked through the tips of his hair. "In fact, you were the one that hit the bludger at me – so in fact, it was your bloody fault I almost died!"

"Oh please, you're a wolf – you'd have lived."

"Then why the hell did you yell at me? For Merlin's sake, Miles – we can't do this every time I almost die or have a near death experience."

"Well then don't almost die every time! I swear on Morgana, if I lose you again; I'll hunt your ass and kick it into next century!"

The bickering, what Harry assumed next to be – couple, continued on fighting as they made their way through the crowd with their brooms in hand. Each threw a leg over the side of their broom in synch, almost as though they'd done it for years, before bursting off into the air – leaving behind loud, loud squeals and moans.

"Damnit, why do Lex and Miles have to be together? I don't stand a chance against Miles – they're always together," cried a witch loudly, only to start shrieking at the reply she got.

"Chill it, Layna. You wouldn't stand a chance even if you _were_ in Miles' place – you ain't got the special thing between your legs!"

Harry stared wide eyed at the cheerful bantering that took place, as the witch cracked back, her friends backing her up. Although Harry could see the witch really did like Lex, she was at least a good sport in realising that she didn't stand a rat's ass chance in winning his heart.

"How do you join one of those teams?" he found himself asking Xavier without his brains consent.

Xavier didn't look surprised at all by the question.

"Those guys you just saw – they go to Nueva. Nueva Academy organises the matches, and you can go against not only the people in your school, but also against the citizens of Elsaphya – both young and old citizens. All matches take place here; across the whole island and," he seemed to be thinking of more rules. "Oh, and matches only take place on Sundays. You have school six days a week otherwise – Monday to Saturday. Usually every Sunday the crowd's around here are huge. Everyone seems to love Quidditch here, and I'd even go as far as to say we love it more than you British."

Man, when was the demon going to stop highlighting he was British? He got the point already! He was a bad British wizard – now stop!

His dark glare warned the demon, who immediately made a mental note to not snub the Brits anymore. Pity. All he was trying to do was to make sure his mate never went back there again. Now he'd have to find another way to get his lovely to stay.

"This is the shop?" Harry asked, eyeing the place dubiously. The sign was of simple wording and wood, painted with dull, dark grey lettering: "Ameryllis' Wands". Also, there was a fish painted in blue next to it. He looked over at Xavier, who grinned boyishly at him.

"Just get your ass in."

Call Harry paranoid, but someone, having a demon talking about his ass was not very comforting.

Inside was stuffy and stifling, and Harry could feel his clothes sticking to his skin. Whether it was sweat or just the humidity, he had no clue. They all seemed the same to him at this point. As they entered, a small lady, elderly of age, looked up.

"Good afternoon," she said demurely, "How may I be of assistance?"

"We need a custom wand for him." A thumb was jerked roughly in Harry's direction, the lady's eyes following the move.

She didn't comment on his age – or why he was getting a wand now. Harry found he liked that about her; the fact that she didn't immediately draw awkward and often wrong, assumptions.

"Hello young one, I am Iana. It is a pleasure to meet you. If you would?" she gestured for his left.

He raised an eyebrow. "My wand hand is my right."

She looked at him, properly annoyed. "That is what you think – this is what I know. Left hand now, boy. We don't have all day."

Reluctantly Harry held out his left hand, watching as she rolled back his sleeve and studied it with a quick, critical sweep of her eyes. She turned it this way and that, before pulling out her own wand. Holding it against his arm, she hmm'd, before turning away.

"This way."

They entered – Xavier behind them, into a dark hollow of a room. It resembled a cave.

"I will run a few compatibility tests. Do you know how to use Legilimecy yet?" At Harry's answer, she carried on. "Good, now I want you to tell me what you hear the thoughts of in this room – thoughts that you find intriguing."

She waited a while, watching as the young lad's face before her twisted up in a thoughtful expression. She could almost feel the tangible mesh of magic that flared throughout the room – as though he was awakening her tools.

Placing a gentle hand on his shoulder, she muttered to him to not open his eyes, and to keep staying relaxed.

"Now, I want you to summon them towards you."

He did just that, after which he slowly opened his eyes. Before him lay an odd ensemble of various ingredients.

Iana made no comment, merely smiling slightly, and shooing Harry and Xavier out.

"I will be done in the hour. Go get your armour from Penelope. She should have finished by now."

Harry didn't bother asking how she knew – instead, he walked straight out of the room and out the shop's doors. He remembered the way to Penelope's – down a level, across the road and three shops down. He found his steps were quick and long as he swung open the doors to her shop. She looked up with a grin, flicking through her magazine with ease even as he appraised her casual stance.

"James, my mother told you that I had finished, no doubt."

She stretched easily, arms over her head, before yawning loudly.

"Alright, here it is. It's good, I must say."

And there, in his hands, was a soft, velvety material. It was feather light, yet as he scrunched it with his fist, he could feel that it was not weak. He dearly wanted to test out how much strain it could take against spells, but didn't try. It could quite possibly offend Penelope; and he didn't want that. Plus, he trusted her.

Unbeknownst to him, Penelope grinned secretly. She knew what he wanted to do, but the fact that he'd taken her feelings into account – hey, if a customer or friend tested things you said were good regardless, you'd be pretty upset, too! – and trusted her, meant a lot to her.

"You should go back to my mother. She lied you know, when she said it would take an hour. She's got some tools that help her – she'd have finished half an hour ago.

Harry looked up, stunned. That wasn't possible; he'd left the shop only fifteen minutes ago. Did that mean she …?

Oh, snap. A time-turner? Nice.

Xavier was already gone. No, wait, Xavier had never even followed him to the shop. Harry took it as his cue to leave. His new body armour was placed carefully into his case, situated near his new familiars.

.o.

His wand had been placed into the wand holder which Iana had kindly supplied him with. It was not like the ones he had seen Moody wearing, but one that fit snugly on his pinkie. At first, he had thought it would feel awkward, but now he liked it.

Apparently his wand was a secret – seriously, it was his wand? But he couldn't argue against her, she was the wand maker, after all – and she hadn't told him what his wand was made out of. The only thing she had told him was:

"The old has been revived and renewed. Reconstructed, and redefined. Thank your secret, who kept your trust."

He had written this down, unable to understand what she had been telling him.

Looking up from his scrawled writing, on tea-coloured paper, he found his eyes locking on a certain person's face.

Xavier Varberhrn. What an odd last name. It sounded warped, as though someone had just asked their friends a number up to thirty, and used them as representations of the alphabet, and then mashed them all together.

But that was impossible, for, who would do that to start their own generation? Certainly not Harry.

Harry had spent the whole day with demon, yet it was only now that he noticed the opposite persons' looks. He had briefly passed over it before, but now it struck him – his hair was like a burning inferno, with different shades of amber and crimson melded together. His eyes – Harry could only slightly remember, were like the shadows.

Such contrast – such an oddity. Harry wondered if the hair was dyed. He held back a snicker. Oh, Merlin, that would be hilarious.

"Is my face so intriguing?" spoke up the demon, one eye peeking open, the other still stuck shut firmly.

"N-No!" Harry held up two hands, in the sign of a cross. When had the guy awoken? "I was just thinking."

The demon sat up – had he finally gotten a clue?

"How much longer until we arrive? And what's Nueva like?"

His fist clenched unconsciously, but he had sort of seen this coming. He still wanted to jump out the train though. Demons weren't really known for their patience.

"Nueva," he started slowly, building a wall to keep back his flooding disappointment. "Is situated in Canada."

Harry knew that. They were on a plane that was titled "The Canadian Express" for Morgana's sake! Some private jet, one of fifty, used to transport new students to the school.

"We are connected to Elsaphya through magical hubs, however it is just a requirement that new persons that are taking their first step onto school grounds is flown in by physical means. Something to do with the barriers that reject new apparators, and floo-ers. After the first time though, you will be free to use our other means of transportation. They're much quicker than this nine hour flight."

The demon ran an annoyed hand through his hair and it struck Harry, that perhaps demons didn't like height.

"Are you—" he gestured wildly with his hands, moving them up and down. The demon seemed to get the message, as he finished off Harry's sentence without so much as a blink.

"—afraid of heights? No."

Harry's shoulders slumped over, and Xavier quickly hastened to talk, to overcome the bout of sadness.

"I told you earlier that Nueva students have classes every day, save Sunday. Your timetable will depend on your classes – for example, those that are taking – I assume you are too, though I have no idea as I usually would, since Anita only gave me a sheet comprised of 'James Ilnoches – Italy, here's the portkey!', and I had been spiralled off to you."

Harry smiled. So the man really didn't have much of an idea of his past. He hoped it would stay that way.

"Back on track, I assume you will be taking Muggle Brawling?" Harry answered, the demon continued. "Muggle Brawling is usually about six in the morning – if you're lucky. Some have it at half past four in the morning. And classes on the Luna cycle, which you won't be taking, can go from dinner until one in the morning." At the gasp from Harry, Xavier grinned. "Be thankful you don't have them the morning after. They're more rattled and on the edge after a lack of sleep, and tend to…well, off people, in an instant. Be careful."

Nodding fervently, Harry hoped to goodness that he had no classes with the Lycanthropes.

"There is a social hierarchy here at Nueva. Just make sure you don't get on the wrong side of it. If you do, just try not to die."

For some odd reason, Harry was starting to regret that he didn't get a teacher that was leading him to the school that actually cared about his well-being in a totally non-sarcastic way. Harry was starting to strain his mind in trying to pick up whether the teacher was being sarcastic with him, or not.

"Oh, look, we're here."

The plane jolted, seats rattling for a good few metres as it rolled along the touchdown area. Casually, the demon stretched, before he took some long strides to a door that was open for them, and down the steps.

"Xavier, you made it back safely." She was a beautiful lady, with glowing silver hair, and piercing ivory eyes – it was as though she held only a hole in the middle of her iris. Her lips were upturned in a smile, and she exuded an aura of power.

"Headmaster Anita." Xavier inclined his head slightly. "Of course, did you expect otherwise?"

His speaking was so formal, so blank and devoid of emotion. Harry didn't know why he felt irked by this.

"Of course not," a tinkly laughter filled the air, as she gestured them forwards. "Hello, you must be James Ilnoches. It is good to have you here with us at Nueva Academia."

Harry smiled formally, nodding at her. "I am glad to have been accepted, Headmaster Anita."

He wasn't really meeting her eyes, however, as his mind was whirling at the fact that behind her was a deserted and desolate piece of land. And as far as his eye could see, that was it.

Taking her hand in a slightly disappointed handshake, he almost dropped her hand like it was something burning hot, as his vision wavered. He snapped his hand back from her, cradling his head between his sweaty palms, eyes tightly shut. From behind his eyelids, he could still see bright lights everywhere. His nose filled with different, numerous scents – and his ears. Hot dang, his ears were picking up so much, now. He could feel them twitching from left to right, atop his head. The sound of many airplanes rushing by and landing, the loud chatter of teenagers, and the cry of spells being screamed.

And the delighted squeal of, "oh, the newbies are here today, right? Come on, let's go set up a _welcoming_ party, especially for that pretty little were over there."

It was probably the way that person had said 'welcoming party', which Harry got a little bit annoyed at. His head shifted up quickly, dark emerald and silver eyes flashing as they glared habitually at the group of older teens that sat on a wall a good thirty meters away from him.

The one that had spoken – how Harry knew which one it was, he had no idea at the time, the dark brown haired one, eyes opened largely, as he noticed the heavy stare he was receiving. He nudged the rest of his friends, shocked. Harry could see his lips forming the words, before he even heard them. "That guy – he can hear us from over there!"

And the reply of: "You're kidding, Enwyn, he's ages away. Stop scaring us like that."

Harry bit his lip to keep himself from snarling at them. Instead, he turned his full attention back to his new Headmaster and might-be-teacher.

His Headmaster was smiling knowingly at him. She didn't comment though. "If you would come this way, James. We just have a few tests we need to conduct to find if you will be able to take the classes which you elected."

As he was led forwards, he found that the path they were following was sandwiched between two large, tall buildings that was slightly cylindrical in shape. It's material was some sort of glass like metal, which he could see ever so slightly into, with his vision, yet lights bounced off it at the same time. It defied the law of reflection, and he dearly wanted to know why. Maybe that was his inner nerd speaking.

They entered into that was behind these two buildings, and he guessed that the ones they passed were the dorm rooms, as he could see potted plants, various pieces of clothing – he blushed, undergarments, too? And many, many traps. He guessed that the one with the body falling out of it had been tasered with some sort of gun, as he could see that the barrel of the gun-like structure was crackling.

As the guy was falling down from the building, he whistled loudly, only to have a shadowy figure dart behind his free-falling body. They then vanished. Harry rubbed his eyes, stunned. He wasn't able to voice out his question, as he found himself standing in a large archway which lead to some sort of underground cavern.

Vastly large, with some sort of botanical garden in the middle, and trees that reached the tops of the ceiling – no easy feat, mind you, as the ceiling was a good sixty to a hundred metres up. He could see, slightly, some lake in the middle of the garden. Plants grew wildly around everyone, seeming to vie for attention with each other.

Cool air billowed against his face, and he stared openly at the various number of creatures that passed by him. The letter hadn't been lying when it had said that the academy was diverse in the aspect of magical creatures.

None paid any attention to him, however.

"Do not worry, James. There is a small notice-me-not charm on you currently. It will have vanished by the time the testing is over." She smiled at him warmly, before uttering, "Welcome to Nueva Academy. You are now on the grounds of Cape Brenton, Nova Scotia, Canada."

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><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>: I know! You're probably all thinking "Why, why is there another author's note?" Well, it's to get things off my chest. Baaha. Well guys, Harry gets to actually freaking enter Nueva next chapter! And the update will probably be in three weeks time – when my holidays start, might I add. Dang, I'm so excited!

Now, about those fortnightly updates. Won't be happening, I don't think. But once every three weeks? A pretty much definite possibility. If you're wondering why, it happens to be because I have assignments to do, my subjects to figure out, and, well, believe it or not, a life. Yes, I have a life.

OH! And I love to write other things too – you know, just random drabbles that have nothing to do with the fanfcition world. Now that you have listened to me for a suitable while – well, that, or you've closed the window, I might as well tell you all that reviews really do help me to write faster, and more.

See you all in twenty something days? Yes, I think so. Hope you come back for more.


	5. The Potter Pheromones

**Warnings: **This will be male/male, slash! and het! Rating may or may not go up. It is OMC/Harry, Sirius/Remus, Lucius/Snape, Neville/Luna etc. Oh, Manipulative Dumbledore, and not-so-lovely-Weasley's, some may be nice, though.

**Disclaimer:** Check previous chapter.

Someone pointed out that it is 'Headmistress' and not 'Headmaster' – kudo's and my thanks to you. I shall be changing it from here on out. And my deepest, deepest thanks to you all for reviews, but especially to 'Ireadtomuch' for reviewing ALL the chapters even though four of the were already out. I was touched. Thanks heaps for it!

Please note that '.o.' is my lovely page break. 'Cuz i'm weird like that.

Chapter V – The Potter Pheromones

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><p>He was seated in a large auditorium. One with chairs aligned in rows of about ten, and twenty abreast. Harry estimated by his guess of the chairs that there was about two hundred new students, just like him.<p>

The headmistress Anita, smiled cordially as the students took their seats.

She stepped up forwards, on to a higher level of the stage, and rested her forearms on the podium.

"Good afternoon everyone. I have met most of you briefly already, but for those of you who do not know, I am Anita Lunciva, the headmistress of Nueva Academia – or Nueva Academy, as some prefer to call it."

Silence reigned supreme over the large hangar, and Harry found himself grinning secretly to himself. It appeared that she called for their attention. He had a feeling he knew what her bloodline was.

"You are here at Nueva to learn. You are here to excel, do well and learn skills that will last you a life time." Her face smoothed out, and her lips firmed. "We do not accept slackers, or people that try anything less than their best. And trust me," she seemed to be looking into everyone's eyes at the same time, "we will know what your best is."

Harry could see some adams apples bobbing, and could even hear the sound of gulps.

"We here, the majority, come from difficult backgrounds caused by our magical creature blood. That is why we tolerate absolutely zero amount of backstabbing and identity crisis outside of Nueva." Her eyes pierced them, and Harry felt a tugging on his heart that compelled him to just agree. "We are one. We are together. There are enough opposing forces outside of here without the added need of collisions within."

Somehow Harry was deeply reminded of Xavier's words. It seemed that Nueva was rather tight-knit.

"However there will of course be fighting and duelling. We ask that you take care of these outside of your schedules during dining times, on Sundays, or the option most of our older students that do not like fighting much prefer - Quidditch."

Emerald eyes twinkled brightly. By the silent grins of approval around him, he knew most of his peers liked the idea. But along with them, he also saw the looks of disapproval and disgust – as though they were saying, 'are you kidding? That's for the weak' – or something of that sort. His eyes narrowed unconsciously.

"Testing for your desired extra courses will now take place. On the back of the chair before you is parchment with your schedule for the testing. Please head to these rooms as required. That is all."

Her face was calm as she headed off the stage holding nothing in her hands to Harry's surprise. He had expected a page of notes for her speech, or something akin to that.

Gripping his schedule in his hand, he briefly read over it.

He had testing with a Miss Aiannah Silvers, who he assumed to be a female, in the Dome.

The Dome? Interesting name. So brief and boring.

_How ironic…_ he thought simply to himself, before shrugging. _Eh, it's not like I named the place._

There was a map attached to the bottom of the paper and he glanced briefly at it. It was charmed rather like the Marauder's map – he had to learn this handy bit of magic soon, and he quickly paced towards the dome.

"James Ilnoches?"

She was a beautiful woman undoubtedly. Although she looked a tad eccentric with electric, bubblegum pink hair, and glittery – literally, eyes. She frowned at him as he approached.

"You're late."

Harry bit back the response that threatened to be spat back _– there wasn't a scheduled time, lady._ Just an order of where to be in what sequence. He knew better than to say this to her however, and kept his mouth shut. Luckily, too.

Her eyes appraised him with a quick sweep, before she gestured for him to stand before her.

"Drink this," she thrust a potion into his hand roughly, before waiting expectantly.

Harry looked at the potion with a considering pause, before switching his gaze back to her.

"Well?" she raised an annoyed eyebrow. Harry could see an emotion in her eye, but he could not place what it was. "We don't have all day. Skull it."

Slowly, he opened his mouth. Only to speak. "I would," he refused to quail beneath her glare, "prefer to know what this is. Explicitly," he added, as he saw her open her mouth, the first syllable of 'Potion', almost slipping through.

A small smirk graced her lips, devoid of her earlier bite.

"Finally, a kid that has the balls to ask."

Harry raised an eyebrow before shrugging. He reckoned it was as close to a compliment as he would get out of the witch.

She gestured to the opaque, pink liquid he held in his hands. It smelt like rancid milk which had been off for months. Don't ask him how he knew what that smelt like. He hadn't meant to accidentally horde the milk and slip it into Vernon's coffee. Honest. Nor had he meant for it to send the pig-his mistake, Vernon, to be sent to hospital for a bad case of diarrhoea and vomiting. It was all just big a coincidence.

"The potion is known in its oldest form as Absonditus Vultus. It was firstly used in the olden times as a form of unreliable Veritasium" – Harry briefly wondered if she was a History teacher, too. "The person was declared guilty if the projected animal was any form of reptile. Many were sentenced to death."

Harry glared at the wall. He found that he rather disliked – almost to the point of hating, the Light wizards. They were just so bigoted it irked and pissed him off, knowing how their prejudices ruled their minds workings so often, how they were so damn opinionated and lastly how they always did what they said was wrong, the bloody hypocrites.

He pulled the potion towards his lips, tipping his head back and gulping it down in a shot. He knew better than to let it linger in his throat. At first when he had been new to trying potions and the like, he had thought it would be interesting to take his time and well, savour the taste. Now he knew better.

His magic was drawn out of him in a pulsing wave and he could feel it draining from him like blood from a wound. A cloudy form took place before his eyes. It was sleek and even as a puff ball of dust he could see the smooth, streamlined muscles that rippled smoothly as the panther moved.

Harry stared intently, enraptured. He shifted closer for a closer look, only to hiss darkly as a hand roughly swept through the image, sending him backtracking.

He looked up into turquoise eyes which stared at him with that damnable, annoying emotion in her eyes that he just couldn't place. He swore that if he was ever made Minister, he would ban the use of unreadable emotions. They were just so infuriating at times.

"You may leave."

Harry translated that, with his awesome skills, as 'get the hell out now, before I castrate you.'

He ran, clasping his paper in his hand and following the directions at a fast speed. He had Elemental Magics testing next with a Jasper Enryx in the Felix Forest.

An odd sense of thrill overrode his sense of fear for forests as he half skipped and half ran towards the jungle of plants. He liked the map, it reminded him of Hogwarts. But he wasn't going to delve into that any more.

He trot slowly down a dirt path, his pace slowed considerably. Harry wanted to take his time – something in his heart just yearned for him to dance in the flowers, and roll around in the piles of leaves and grass. But well, he had his masculine pride.

Around him he could see many different species of plants that he had never come across back in London in the Forbidden Forest.

Plants grew at alarming speeds. He could tell from the way that the bamboo shoot which had at first been only at his knee was now at his shoulders. He wondered briefly if they were giving it some special hormone to make it grow faster. He could do with some of that on his herb collection.

He followed the path for a while surefootedly, even as the path began to get rocky and full of potholes. It seemed as though his feet always knew the surest, safest path.

There was a whoosh of air and his eyes widened fractionally before narrowing. He leapt backwards in the nick of time, narrowly missing the tree which landed directly where he had been half a second ago.

He didn't whirl around as one would, but listened carefully.

There was no sound – no sound to indicate that anything else was coming.

He threw himself to the left, crashing harshly into a tree. Bark slashed across his forearms and shoulders, and it freaking _stung_. But it didn't faze him. He was too far gone – too intimately connected with his senses that only his subconscious was working.

He found himself rolling and ducking multiple times a second, and it didn't even occur to him to understand how he knew these attacks were racing towards him. His body just _did_.

During his dodging spree his pupils had dilated, emerald flattening into a harsh, stormy visage of both jade and silver sparring. However Harry never knew as he kept going – kept moving, and never stopping. Wistfully at the back of his mind, a thought that struck him after he finished dodging his hidden attackers hits. It was that his tail never got in the way. In fact it served as a great balancer - he was now able to shift his weight to and from any direction with ease.

"Whoever it is, just come out already!"

His back was pressed harshly against rough bark, but he paid no regard to it. No, all his attention was focussed solely on the piercing amethyst eyes locked with his. Silky locks of snow white hair tumbled over slight but firm shoulders, and Harry found his tongue stuck to the back of his throat.

_Beautiful._

He screamed at himself after that thought almost slipped through his lips. His anger fuelled him. He glared heatedly at the body that kept him pinned to the tree, for fear of touching the other's torso.

"James Ilnoches, I presume?"

"You presume? You only presume?" Harry asked, incensed. The man was kidding, right? Why would the man have attacked first and asked questions later? Was Harry the only one that saw something wrong with this?

"I presumed," said the man evenly. "It appears I am correct, so hush."

Hush. Oh, now the man had to be kidding. Harry had never been one for rules. And he sure as hell hadn't been one for obeying attacking strangers. Attackers were bad enough, but for them to be strangers was just plain odd.

Then, the man did the oddest thing.

He waved Harry off, as though trying to get rid of him.

"H-Huh?" Harry glared at the man, his hand cocked on his hip in a feminine manner. The forest around them seemed to darken with anger, sunlight dimming, and trees beginning to close in on them. "What do you mean, go away? I ain't going anywhere!"

"Calm down, kit. I've tested you, you can go now."

Harry was getting tired of being called kit by two people. Sure, maybe he was a kitsune – but that didn't mean that they got to give him a nickname. He didn't like being called kit, he'd rather be called something else – almost anything else.

"Kit?" He found himself groaning – oops. "Why kit of all things?"

"You're a Kitsune Magi – which is a mouthful." Blank, amethyst eyes sparked with something, but Harry couldn't place his finger on it. "So now you are kit."

The raven haired teen refused to give in to the temptation to just throw his head back and wail.

"But I don't want to be called kit," he hissed childishly, his tail between his legs and ears flattened against his head.

The man regarded him for a long second before smiling slightly. "Too bad," he said smoothly, before turning on his heel, the forest eating his form up. "See you later, kit."

A while after he had vanished, Harry still stood there, dumbstruck. Had the man just…? His brain answered himself for him - yep. He glared at the now empty forest, before making his way out.

He had another test now.

Oh Merlin, he had it with Xavier Vaberhrn. Oh lordie. How was he supposed to survive this one? The man had issues. Something smelt and felt off about the man whenever Harry was near him. But then again, it was probably because the man was a shadow _demon_.

He made his way over to the underground chambers as told by his map. His steps were slow and jerky, as though he was debating and not wanting to go where he was headed. He dearly wished to just veer off and walk in another direction. But something continued to pull him with a steady thrum towards the underground lair and soon enough, he was pacing down cold, cement steps. The very air around him began to drop in temperature and he shivered violently.

It was way too silent for his comfort

"It's cold," hot air blew against his ear, and Harry jumped away from the source of it, screaming loudly. "Isn't it, James?"

"Varberhrn, get back," snarled Harry. He knew his extra appendages were spiky from distress. "There is such a thing as personal space, you know. And you're like, in mine." When the other made no move to move, he added, "So get out."

"Rhetorical, but I assume I must answer," the demon smiled easily, before placing a hand on Harry's back and leading him down the rest of the staircase. Unconsciously, Harry leaned in towards the heated touch on his skin. "There is such a thing as personal space, but not even that can come between us."

"Cheesy old man," Harry muttered to himself, under his breath. Unfortunately for him, Xavier heard him.

The demon merely smirked, filing that comment away for later. He would use it against his mate at a later date.

Seconds later found the two standing in the middle of a pentagon, runes of different structures and types patterning the floor. Frigid temperatures, a warm demon on hand, and a blushing kitsune was not so bad a combination, as Harry soon found out.

At first he had thought that the other would do something weird to him, like all the other times. But he soon found out that the man was very professional. A bunch of questions ranging from absolutely personal to outrageously odd were thrown his way.

"Have you ever slept with someone before?" – was the oh-so-serious question coming from a heavy stare.

"What?" shrieked Harry, waving his arms, "What has this got to do with Ancient Runes?" He couldn't help but ask this. Afterall, what sane person would just answer without wondering? "And, no, I haven't!"

The demon neatly sidestepped the question which had been aimed at him, and instead threw another back. "Is the reason for you taking Ancient Runes because you need it as a prerequisite for another course in the future years?"

"Not that I know of," answered Harry truthfully.

"What experience have you had with the arts of," Harry honestly thought the demon was about to ask a sensible question about his experience with Ancient Runes. However he should have learnt by now not to expect normal, mundane things with this man. "Sexual pleasure?"

A dark, crimson flush overtook Harry's face. "I refuse to answer that!" His arms were wrapped tightly around himself. It wasn't because of the cold anymore.

"Hmm," murmured the demon, before flipping a page over. His eyes darted down the page. "I'll find out another time," he muttered to himself, before asking his next question. "Have you ever used any runes previously?"

Now see? Asked Harry to himself, the man could have asked that one just earlier. But no, he had to be difficult.

"I have before."

The demon scowled minutely, "How? Where and when? Did you have another teacher?"

"Could you go any faster, old man?" startled Harry, waving his arms, only to have his eyes widen at the others next words.

"I can and I will, as you will soon find out," he leered, gazing at the other with such intensity that Harry felt a shiver run down his spine.

"I don't know what you mean by that, but it was just a simple rune that I learnt from the library."

The temperature no longer seemed to drop.

Calmly, the other handed him a bronze dagger; perfectly clean and shining in the candlelight. Harry got the hint and sighed, but handed back the dagger. He didn't see any point in re-doing another rune, when he could just re-call his out.

He hissed softly and bit his thumb, a trickle of blood on his bottom lip. Dropping to his knees in an abrupt movement, he found that it didn't jolt his body once he relaxed his muscles. Carefully he swept his thumb back and forth, calling on the rune.

Smoothly this time and without a squeak, his luggage which he yet to put away in a dorm, rose.

He turned to look at the demon, only to find him already by his side, glancing at the fading rune of blood which was vanishing by the second.

"Impressive," was the only word that left those pale lips, before a, "What language were you using?"

Harry cocked his head to the side confusedly. He didn't know very much about Ancient Runes, but he did know that almost anyone in the arts of it would know what language he had used. "Latin."

The head beside him shook slowly. "I have heard Latin many times before, James. That was not Latin. Parseltongue I would guess, if anything."

"But I said 'aberto'," retorted Harry, "if that ain't Latin, I don't know what is."

"Isn't," corrected Varberhrn, "if that isn't Latin." He raised his hand to silence the other, before continuing. "And you didn't say aberto. You hissed something similar, but with a definite ring of a different language."

At Harry's surprised look, the demon sighed. "It is possible that you're slowly adapting Latin into parseltongue, to allow for more difficult and stronger runes."

Harry mulled over the thought. Surprisingly, he rather liked that concept. For a while now, he had found that he cared less and less about what people said about snake-speakers and the dark arts. Were they really so dark? Was it not possible to kill someone, without the use of dark magic? And when had he gotten so philosophical?

He wondered over the last question with deep thought. Perhaps it was from the long solitude he had endured. Oh, he wondered what had happened to Hermione. And the Weasley's that were his friends. And Remus. And Sirius – oh hell, all of them!

He supposed he could write a letter to them soon…but he didn't have Hedwig. This could be a problem. He chewed on his lip slowly.

"James?" Harry was shaken from his reverie gently.

Emerald eyes blinked slowly. "Yes?"

"You may leave," carefully the demon pushed him towards the entrance – and exit, of the room.

Before he left, Harry glanced over the room as though to memorise it. Stone walls, flooring and roofing. The ceiling was not very high off the ground, about two and a half metres or so, and the room was in the shape of a square. There was not much of a design to it but for the small indented circle in the middle which had grooves – for what, Harry had no idea.

Harry left the room easily, slipping out the arched doorway and up the winding staircase. At the top he was met with bright, blinding light. He squinted heavily, eyes closing to half-mast.

He had no need to look at his slip of paper, as he already remembered where he was to be.

Passing by a potions room, he found himself in the medical wing. His feet planted themselves outside a simple door. It was unadorned but for a simple block of wood with a red cross painted on it. Upon entering after a hesitant knock and replied 'come in', Harry found himself standing in open awe.

Most medical places and sick-bay areas were white-washed, with scarily clean white beds and sheets, and walls which were void of colour. However this medical room was _wild_.

Untameable trees reached out with fervour, their branches ranging from the heavens to the East and to the West. The temperature was humid, but he found that as he walked down the canopy of trees that served as an arc over a number of beds that stretched on, that it changed. He was hit with a gust chilly air, before being subjected to almost unbearable heat. He took a step back. His skin felt scorched.

"Ah," a tinkling laugh, belittled only by the sharp stare he received. "You might wish to take a different route, Mister Ilnoches. That temperature is suitable only for Incubi and Succubi." Piercing grey eyes glazed over, taking a delightedly blank look. She smiled serenely at him.

"I am Reina Sydehan, and I am one of two teachers at Nueva for healing."

She withdrew a simple knife, before reaching out to grab his hand. Harry took a step back, snapping his hands behind his back. That knife was damn sharp.

She raised an eyebrow at his movement - a perfect arch of a brow. "What are you doing, Mister Ilnoches?"

"Saving my hand."

Rolling her eyes dramatically, she took a step forward, only to be thwarted as he paced backwards – almost tripping over a small shrub beneath his left.

"James," she admonished, his first name slipping through her perfect, peach lips. "I demand that you stop this, and let me cut you."

"You see?" he asked, emerald eyes glazed open wide, "that's exactly why I don't want to!"

Harry then found out that nurses and healers, in particular, did not like being disobeyed. A flash of magic and a squawk of indignation from Harry, found himself suffering from five different wounds across his arms, a leg, his cheek and one ear. Harry learnt his lesson – do not mess with a teacher when it comes to Healing and obeying.

Pacing back once, she smiled at her handwork. Twirling her knife once, she studied him before placing the knife down onto a table. Harry noticed the handle hung off the edge of the table, and sighed. He had a problem with errors like that, after so many years in a kitchen. He had lost count of the times he'd sliced and cut himself on accident because Dudley, Aunt Petunia or Uncle Vernon had left the handle hanging off the edge. Heck, Dudley had once left the _blade_ hanging off the edge. The idiot.

Still glaring at the blade, he found it suddenly pushed inwards so that nothing was over the edge. He glanced up, only to be met with laughing grey eyes. "You've cooked before, huh?"

Harry nodded silently, shrugging.

"Pull back your sleeves, please. And roll up your pants."

Harry didn't dare to disobey. He hurried to comply, not wincing as he passed the rips in his clothing from her knife attack.

"Good job, James," she whistled lowly. "You've healed yourself already. Was that consciously?"

Jet black hair shook slowly, bangs covering emerald eyes as he answered her verbally. "No, I didn't even think about healing myself."

"Hm," she stared at him for a second longer, before writing down a few notes on the paper behind her. "Alright, you may leave now. We're all done."

Harry smiled and complied, leaving the room slowly. He didn't want to leave again, just like he hadn't wanted to leave the forest earlier. There was just something so comforting about the place which made it feel like home. Like Hogwarts had.

Memories flashed around him.

He swore under his breath, before sighing. It looked like he still had a long way to go until he got his feelings under control. Rubbing at his eyes, he knew he wasn't crying. He forced himself not to cry. Crying was a sign of weakness and Harry knew better than anyone that in times like these, appearing weak was the worst thing he could do.

He gripped his paper tightly, only to stop in surprise. The teacher for his last testing, 'Blood Rites' had been struck off. There was a line at the bottom of everything, with instructions on where to go in an hour.

An hour to kill, fantastic.

Kicking the scruff of his shoes against the pebbles, he followed the path randomly. He didn't pay any attention to the stares or whispers. Briefly he wondered where in Merlin's name the notice-me-not charm had gone, but didn't really pay much attention to it. He was focused on ignoring. He just continued to walk.

Walk that is, until someone grabbed his shoulder and yanked him back.

"Hey!" the cry left his lips as he was spun around, swirling silver and emerald clashing heavily with piercing amber. It was the brown haired guy from before.

Harry didn't glare. Why, he liked to say he handled the situation pretty darn well. In fact, he thought he'd done such a good job, he didn't understand why the guy backtracked from him fiercely, a distorted, confused look on his face.

"Enwyn?" The guy before Harry jolted, spinning around on his foot heavily.

"F-Falin?" Enwyn looked at her with his eyes large - pupils slitted.

"Calm down," she placed a hand placatly on his arm, her eyes sliding to a glare as she focussed on Harry. "Oh, a new kid? What're you doing over here, huh kiddo?" She was up in his face, her hair tickling his cheeks, but he didn't back down. He stared right back at her, duelling the sparks that flew from her eyes with glints of his own. "You've got guts. We like guts here. But we don't like newbie students who are up themselves. I don't care whether you're wearing a hood 'cuz you're ashamed or proud, but take it the hell off!"

Harry didn't say anything. He just sighed inwardly and kept silent. He didn't want to start any fights when they weren't even into the school year. But honestly, she was asking for it, right? Her face couldn't contort into a sneer any more than it already was. And in his peripheral vision, he could see her hand beginning to morph into furry claws.

He just had to pick the werewolf to tussle with, huh.

Well, he always had, had the Potter luck. He reinforced his magic, letting it surge around his core and fluctuate around his physical form. Already his mental shields were being erected and fortified, and he felt comfortable knowing that she would definitely not be able to penetrate them.

Falin's lips lifted in a snarl at the way other refused to back down. Her animalistic side was beginning to take over and she could feel the changes rippling down her spine. Harry couldn't help the small quirk of his lips as he noticed this. It seemed he enjoyed fighting more than he let on.

He stood stock still, posture relaxed and calm, before as though he was shocked, he lunged at her at the exact same time she lunged at him. He was slammed backwards, the hood on his head flinging off and his ears popping out and twitching like mad.

With his chest heaving and panting, himself sprawled on the ground comfortably, Harry learnt an important lesson that day. He learnt that werewolves were attracted to pheromones. Pheromones which apparently Kitsune Magi leaked. In other words, _he_ leaked.

He squeaked loudly as suddenly all the eyes around him seemed to dilate, burning orbs pinning onto his frozen form.

Then, they leapt.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>: Late update? WHERE. Jokes. I know I was late. I'm really sorry, guys :x Blame gaming, it's gotten me so addicted. So I'm really behind schedule. I was meant to have written four or so chapters these holidays, but I barely even finished this one. Apologies for its shortness, but I wanted to let it out tonight.

OH, and I'm looking for a beta : so PM me if you want to. I only really ask for good English, a love for Harry Potter, and a good eye. Oh, and I hope you have awesome jokes, too.

Man guys, it's three in the morning, and I've turned a year older. Ugh. I just wanna crawl beneath my blankets and sleep.

Finished: 13/7/11

Unbeta'd.


	6. Rule Seven Hundred and Sixteen

**Warnings:**This will be male/male, slash! and het! Rating may or may not go up. It is OMC/Harry, Sirius/Remus, Lucius/Snape, Neville/Luna etc. Oh, Manipulative Dumbledore, and not-so-lovely-Weasley's, some may be nice, though.

**Disclaimer:** Check previous chapter.

I _was_ in a cynical, really bad mood. Excuse the follow which you will read. As well as that; yes, Harry is a bit more cocky than one should be with his level of power – but that will change. He will realise that how he is isn't right, and he will correct these mistakes through frustration and will power. Just you wait, Harry Potter will make it through yet.

Also, to the person who reviewed under the name of '**Timber**'. As I couldn't privately message you this, I decided to post it here. So – Harry is a submissive. Yes, that is true. But why on earth does he have to be a bitch just because of that? That's just like saying chicks are bitches just 'cuz we can get pregnant!

And yeah, so Harry's meant to be a larger than life hero as you stated and how he can't be that just because he'd get preggers; but did I ever state that there was going to be mpreg? Let me tell you – no. I didn't. So please stop just assuming mindless things which I have never stated.

And yes, I can see a sub as a hero too. You got a problem with that? Then close the window and don't read on. Simple, bro. Like my reply to you.

Anyway, enjoy the chapter, guys! I'm so sorry for the late update and loss of work and all that jazz.

Chapter VI – Rule Seven Hundred and Sixteen

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><p>All his emerald eyes could see were the shadows of the figures as they leapt out at him, before he sighed in resignation to the fact he was going to be pummelled beneath their combined mass. They neared him – and his eyes slid shut tightly. Perhaps this was atonement for all his sins in his past life. Not that he really believed in it, but hey, you could never disregard stories as they probably did hold at least an ounce of truth.<p>

He just wished that he'd have been able to train up and explore the world. Too late for that now.

The sunlight which had been previously streaming and tanning his face, vanished – the cold silence of darkness enveloping him. His eyes tightened from behind his lids, but he refused to whimper.

The wind on his face increased in speed, and his mind could hardly comprehend what was happening as the next thing he heard was a husky growl.

"_Down, Ilnoches."_

Harry complied instinctively. He somehow knew that this person was going to save his hide. And thus he dropped down to his knees faster than a bat of an eyelash, his emerald orbs shuttering from closed to open within a second, to try figure out just what was going on.

And lo and behold, he was stunned into silence as he stared confusedly at the werewolves who continued to circle him in a large arc snarling viciously, but never taking a step closer. It was as though there was some invisible barrier keeping them at bay from him.

He blinked furiously, aiming to get rid of the sunlight which targeted his sensitive eyes into being cast down.

"Back away," calmly spoken, yet the threat behind the words were tangible. Harry hadn't spoken them – his saviour had.

There was a chaotic rumble of rebellion near the back but it was silenced quickly. Harry was utterly in the dark at what was going on, but he soon found to his relief that the ring of different hybrid-Weres had dispersed. Meaning he was left stranded in the middle of the forest.

Absolutely alone – what?

His saviour had vanished also, leaving behind a simple, elegant note. Which upon reading sent blood roaring to his head in anger, brows creased downwards. Slowly they eased out as he sighed loudly, before dropping to his ass in annoyance. He leant his back against the grass and used the paper to block out the sun, re-reading it over and over.

'_Pride comes before a fall.'_

He rubbed his forehead – suddenly exhausted. He didn't want to deal with this. He just couldn't deal with this. He needed his pride. If he let it go – his grip on his mentality…no. He shook his head and stood to his feet unsteadily. He wasn't ready to let go of his pride. And that was that.

He failed to notice the shadow that looked at him with fathomless sanguine eyes.

.o.

Harry found he was slightly amazed at Nueva, for, even though his tryouts had just taken place erewhile, he was already seated in his first class.

Muggle brawling.

_Fantastic_.

He was terribly pumped to show everyone just how his unrefined brawling skills ranked against theirs. He had a feeling he'd top the list – if the list comprised of the bottom in skill at the top, that is.

Chewing his lip thoughtlessly, he sat against the wall with his back straight. He was near the other new recruits who were milling about it odd, small clusters.

Harry stretched out like a cat before hanging his head against his chest and mulled over fully entering his memories. The sooner he did this, the better. He could be clean. Tempting; so very, very tempting.

But in situations like this, procrastination was the best course of action.

And thus, he would do it later. He would absolutely do it later. Another day. Maybe next week. Possibly a year or two's time. Hopefully never. Yes, he was rather falling in love with the last option. But don't blame him, it was seducing him—

"Alright, maggots!"

Freaked, Harry jolted to life at the commanding tone of the voice. He found himself standing shoulder to shoulder with some random students, and also noticed that the mess of students had magically transformed into a perfectly straight line.

Well, it _was_ a magic school after all.

His eyes roved around the room, discretely taking note of some random facts. He hadn't bothered earlier upon his entrance to the large sparring room.

He noticed how the room was large and had concrete flooring – or well, mainly just how the room had concrete flooring. Because really, weren't people meant to fall and tumble in places like these? He shivered just thinking about the impact one would make with the cold ground if they were to ever be slammed in it.

Again, Harry felt entirely very much uncomfortable that there was not a single first aid box in sight. He knew he was going to be kissing the ground more times than he could count, and he had thought that the academy would have been kind enough to have at least provide mats of some sort so his teeth didn't go straight _through_ his lips.

But then again, as he thought over it, there was something else that was distinctly making him even more uncomfortable than the danger hazards posed by the room.

It was the stares. The stares, may he add, which were absolutely hot and _heavy_.

Was there something on his face? Or had he sat on something dirty earlier? Because he was receiving some very odd looks to both his lips and ass. But hey, whatever.

His brows furrowed as he assumed that they were probably just curious about his race. At Nueva, he had discovered that there was an unsaid, but very obvious of "figure it out yourself" rule, regarding races. Apparently it was like asking someone what their gender was –very offensive. In fact, according to a handing banner he'd seen earlier when nature had called him, it constituted to a duel according to the challengers terms. Usually either wand, wandless, weapons or weaponless.

Harry didn't sigh aloud wearily. He was too afraid of the imposing, tall man that stood before them all.

The man was thick. As in, his body. Not his length. His width. Not his girth. His uh, _torso, _of course. He was like a thickly corded rope – of pure muscle. But that wasn't the thing that warned Harry away from the man the most. It was instead the sight of the man bradishing a large wooden paddle in one, and a deeply blushing Incubi in the other.

Harry didn't even _want_ to know what was going on. He had a broad enough idea from the smirks on the faces of the other male demons in the room.

"I am Caedmon Alchand, your brawling teacher." He spat the words out as though they left a disgusting taste in his mouth. His oak scented and coloured hair was cropped short. Scars could be seen along his shoulder blades.

Harry wanted that man's shoulders. Really, they were broad and filled out with muscle. He on the other hand…he glanced down at his slim build. He needed to go look up some growth enhancement potions. He wanted to grow already, damnit!

"You will all address me as 'Sarge', or 'Sir', you hear me?"

Alchand paced up and down the length of the line of students, glaring intimidatingly into each of their terrified eyes. All of their backs, interestingly enough, had much better posture as soon as he glanced at them.

"I do not, and will not tolerate lateness, skipping or," he eyed Harry disdainfully for a second, as though glaring him through the ground, "pansies."

Harry bristled. He sort of really rather wanted to send a fiery bolt of lightning to strike the man down – at the same time as rising some sort of inferno to incinerate the dude first. But he didn't. He couldn't. Firstly because he was trying to keep his status as a Magi Kitsune a secret, and secondly because he had little to no control over his powers. But damn it all to hell and back if he allowed the man to call him a pansy!

His cousin had called him that numerous times, and back then when he had not known the meaning, he had not been that against it. But now? Now he was.

"I will be testing your overall fitness today followed by numerous combat duels. I will have you all know that here at Nueva we take studies very seriously." He was still eyeing Harry. "You flinch, you fail. You fail – you die. You die – I eat you. Understood?"

There was silence. Even Harry was tongue-tied. He'd be eaten? No thank-you very much. He preferred having his limbs intact and connected to his body.

"I said, _understood_?" The man thankfully did not spit. But his words echoed and resounded loudly in the cavern of a room.

"Sir, yes sir!" They cried back at him fearfully. Harry was one of the ones who yelled it back - not fearfully mind you, but slightly intimidated. The man was hell'a scary. He bet even Snape would have bended over to the man and said a yes. Heck, he'd even go as far to say that Snape would have said yes _sir,_ too.

"Good maggots." Alchand smirked patronisingly. "Now run until I say stop!"

Their straight backs, stiff hands and closed mouths changed into a speeding mass of bodies as they bolted as far away from the man as possible. Needless to say, there were no complaints.

The sound of the soles of their shoes hitting the dirt was a quick and repetitive beat.

.o.

It was a long time until some of them faltered.

They had been running for a while now, and although Harry felt exhausted out of his mind, and his body felt like it was being weighed down by bricks, he could see he was one of the few that felt this way. The only other people was a dark haired girl who was gasping for air – in a pretty manner, mind you, and a red eyed group of mixed genders. He assumed they were Incubi and Succubi. He'd have thought that they'd have the longest stamina…

But yes, he switched his mind to other topics. Like how badly he yearned to drop out much like how the dark haired girl had just done.

But he didn't. Instead he rubbed his eyes, breathed in deep and grit his teeth together harshly. He would do this.

Curiously he could feel his core of magic. It was humming within him – purring like a kitten, actually. It was possible, he mused, that his magic liked his body being exercised and pushed to the limit. It was almost as though it was _proud_ of him.

Slowly his steps evened out, and he fell into a comfortable gait. His previously unconfident gait had vanished like a puff of smoke. His breaths slid in and out smoothly and his eyes were blank – but not glazed over, as his conscience slid to the back of his mind. He was no longer in control of his body.

Instinct was.

His legs moved at a tempo that was steadily increasing, and the leading runners faltered in surprise. The boy who had been constantly lagging behind the main pack of runners had begun to draw level with them.

And the vampires were not happy with it.

Their eyes narrowed fractionally as their naturally competitive nature began to override their slight fatigue. They upped their pace.

Legs were beginning to blur and the room suddenly went silent.

All signs of breathing – gone.

Everyone had begun to control their inhalations and exhalations; their minds so deeply focused on purely just placing one foot in front of the other that none of them saw the calculative gleam in their teacher's eyes.

He let them run some more, before clapping shortly once. "That is enough."

A few befuddled moments later, Harry finally managed to get his body under control. His lungs were burning, and he had no idea how he had not realised it before. He felt like he was walking on jelly. Or his legs were jelly. He couldn't think straight.

He, along with the mass, stepped towards their teacher slowly. Hesitantly, almost.

He eyed them all in silence. Slowly he opened his mouth. "Line up."

They lined up quickly and efficiently in a perfectly straight line. Because tired body or no, everyone had some sort of inkling that their current sores would look babyish compared to what would happen if they disobeyed. That, or obeyed in a messy fashion. And so, the line could have been set by an OCD architect himself.

He began to count them off as he went down the end. Harry assumed they were to remember their numbers. He was number thirteen. He shook his head. What bad luck he had.

"Number one will battle forty-five. Number two will battle forty-four. Number three will battle forty-three and so on."

His mind streamed through numbers. He was going to be against number thirty-three.

"You will all be known as 'pair something' depending on your number. The smaller of your numbers will be called out. Pair seven, mat one. Pair twelve, mat two." He droned on, and Harry grunted to himself as his name and mat twenty-one was called.

Two teenagers shifted out of their place in the line and moved towards one of twenty-two large sparring mats that lay against the floor of the room. Harry had no idea what one of them was, but the other he knew was a Vampire. The fangs and pale skin were a giveaway.

"You fight until one is knocked out or concedes defeat," he leered at them evilly, and the group got the message that he would not accept any concedes of defeat. Harry wanted to join the silent mob of bets being made that the man would ignore any pleads of giving up.

Making his way to his mat, he wondered distantly about how the man was going to keep his eye on so many students at once, and also what would happen to that one leftover student. He didn't receive a verbal answer for either.

He stood awkwardly to one corner of the mat and watched his opponent warily. Pansy blue eyes stared back at him. A male Veela. He was distinctly reminded of Draco Malfoy. He wondered briefly how the git was doing. He hadn't spoken to the guy ever since their tentative truce.

A bell rang.

The body of blond locks and skinny build darted towards him and Harry assumed that bell had been the signal for the fight to begin.

He also realised that he had come across this thought a little slow, and that he was already seconds behind the attacking blond. He was slammed in the chest; the air rushing out of him in an audible choke of wind. He could distinctly feel a fist making contact with his collar bone. It didn't shatter thankfully, but Harry knew it was going to leave a harsh bruise.

But the blows did not stop there.

He was thrown down on the mat as his legs were swept of the ground, and his arm throbbed painfully. He could only imagine how many hits the veela had gotten in during his dazed blank. With a slightly distressed moan at seeing some feet near his head; he glanced up to notice his teacher there, staring at him with a look of scorn in his eyes.

Harry saw red. That was bloody _it_. He could only take so much before the disdain got to him. Damn his teacher for looking like his Uncle.

Harry snarled in response, before bringing his feet up to his chest and slamming them harshly into the Veela. The beauty flew black, crashlanding somewhere pretty far from the still dazed inky haired teen. He rubbed a hand over his eyes furiously before rolling to his feet. He'd be darned if he went down without a fight.

The Veela recovered as quickly as him and he found himself fending off blows that were not aimed for anything in particular. Harry guessed that the Veela had probably had about as much fighting lessons as he had. It was all attack with no real aim except to win but pure brutal strength and no tactics.

Ducking beneath a blow aimed at his head, he threw back his arm and hit the Veela in the face. He could hear a loud crunch – could feel it beneath his fist, even.

He drew his hand back. Blood was smeared against it. He flinched as he looked at the bloody sight the Veela made, as the other reeled back and cried out in horrified pain before launching at Harry once again.

He barely avoided the other. Harry's emerald eyes widened as he noticed in the edge of his peripherals a long leg kicking out towards his head and he barely sidestepped under it; only to trip in the process.

"Blast it," he muttered tiredly. Stupid clumsiness.

He fell forwards and towards the Veela groaning audibly all the way. He had a bad feeling.

The light of ferocity within the Veela's eyes dimmed slightly. A tinge of amusement entered them, before Harry found himself toppling into the Veela; his elbow crashing against the other's temple. Oh snap – his luck was starting to get better. He fell heavily onto the larger body, gasping and spluttering. He wondered why he hadn't been chucked off yet.

Looking down, he stared into closed eyes. What a beautiful face. Intricate features that called to him, but he was able to throw off the Veela pull with a little more effort than it usually would have taken him had he not been so battered. The broken nose near his face irked him, and he couldn't help the swell of sadness at having caused the other pain.

His hand moved without his knowledge, hovering just above the other's nose.

"He's gonna smash the other's broken nose into bits _again_? Crap, he's twisted." The heated whisper swirled around his ears and Harry felt a rage of fury bubble up within him. He was not disgusting like that.

"You fools might do that," his attention was focused on the Veela again, "but I am not an animal."

His magic thrummed beneath his skin. It didn't want to leave him – it was comfortable with him. _Go on,_ he nudged at it gently. Lovingly. Slowly, like a sulking child it seeped out of the palm of his hand and hovered over the other's face, not yet doing its job. It seemed to pout at Harry, upset, but the boy pushed it along.

Slowly the magic swirled around the Veela, before rushing beneath and into the other's body. A faint halo of green enveloped him, and Harry stood back. The nose was reconstructing itself, and he could see the bones mending back into place.

He turned around, only to see his teacher looking at him with a lack of emotion on his face. He felt shivers race up his spine but remained absolutely silent.

For some odd reason, he felt like a bad child standing before his parents after he'd done something naughty. But he couldn't know for sure, because he's never actually…wait, he took that back. It felt like he was standing before Snape after wiping out another batch of potions. Yes, that was about right.

"Go wash up and be back here in five."

Harry's jaw dropped open. Five? Five measly minutes to shower and get changed? The man…wow. He was definitely from the army. Sighing, but complying, Harry ran in the direction the man indicated.

Harry failed to notice that he had not been told off.

.o.

The room he slipped into was crammed chock-a-block full with other males in cubicles that only reached up to their waists – so basically everything was for everyone else's viewing pleasure. The doors to each cubicle were guarded only by tiny sliver locks. Harry bet mentally that even he could break down the short doors easily. That is, if it could even be called a door. It was more like a hurdle for kindergarten students.

There was not enough shower stalls for all of them, and he could see more than a few of them already changing back into their sweaty gear. They showered fast.

He remembered his five-minute time constraint.

Over half of the forty-four had already finished their matches and were showering. More than a few were sporting cuts and vivid lilac bruises. He snagged a thin white towel from the rack of folded ones. Merlin, he hoped it was clean.

Slithering into a corner near the back of the room with the least people, he stooped beneath the showerhead and cranked the tap on. A quick glance around the room settled his fears slightly, and he quickly tugged his shirt over his head, followed by his jeans.

Twisting the shower knob with a flick of his wrist, water cascaded down his back; his hair flowing in rivulets over his shoulders.

He missed the leers sent his way.

Quickly and efficiently he soaked his hair thoroughly before reaching for the soap blindly. It squelched through his fingers and slipped to the ground. He groaned softly and his eyes squinted open before he bent down and picked it up. He was half way to standing when there was a rancorous snarl and he found himself pinned to the wall; a manic glint in one of the lycanthrope-yet-still-human-but-not-quite-sane's eyes.

"Uhm, hello?" he asked weakly.

His reply was a low growl.

"Erm. I don't suppose you would, I don't know, get out of my shower stall?"

He was pushed harder against the wall.

"I guess that's a no. "His cheek was numb against the icy, wet tiles. Gushes of water streamed down his bangs and over his eyes. His vision was blurry.

The wolf in human form pushed Harry's head forwards, displaying his neck for all to see. The tan column of soft skin was quickly covered by a hot, wet mouth the next second. A small squeak later, Harry found his neck stinging. He'd been bitten. He shivered against the wall, twisting around uncomfortably. He was just lucky that it wasn't the full moon, and the man hadn't inserted him with seed. Oh, that would be bad. He'd be a werewolf and a magi kitsune? He didn't really see that working.

A hand began to slide up his leg and he kicked backwards roughly, loving the sound of the man gasping sorely. At least he knew he hadn't missed.

However to his annoyance the mouth on his neck still remained fast. Hands pinned above his hand, Harry knew he was in a rather helpless position. His eyes flashed with anger as the hand rode higher, now on his ass.

"Get the hell off'a me!" Rasping he scraped the wall with his nails and he tensed and untensed, trying to break free from the grip his hands were bound in.

"I'll make you mine, little one."

Oh Merlin, no.

Gritting his teeth, he drew his magic towards him, ignoring the body all but humping against him.

Snarls and growls rippled through the air, but he had no chance to see why they were so angry, nor why the weight behind him seemed to suddenly lessen. He whirled around; a scream alerting him to the fact that something was attacking his attacker.

His hair was plastered over his eyes, and he struggled roughly, swiping at his eyes to rid them of water. Slowly clearing, his vision swirled before he could focus.

Focus on a room _void_ of conscious people.

He swung around, gaping. Who had saved him? Was it the same man as before?

"What's taking you maggots so long? Out! Now!"

His teacher from hell. With a started cry, he leapt into action.

Scrambling to the shower knobs, he twisted it roughly between two shaking hands. He grabbed his towel and began drying off rapidly, forgetting he was a wizard. Jumping into his clothing, he sighed in relief, as he no longer felt so exposed.

Running towards the doorway, he bent down and snagged his shoes and socks, hopping as he pulled them on at the same time as dodging over bodies.

Sweet Merlin, everyone in the room had been knocked out. No one had escaped. Just why would someone save him? He knew he had no friends. It couldn't have been a Were, since the person hadn't tried to claim him.

"_Don't make me repeat myself."_

Squeaking, Harry yanked the door open and entered back into the sparring room, hair still wet and droplets flying everywhere.

He stared wide-eyed as suddenly the genre of spectrum which he had been looking at before; showers and stalls, suddenly spiralled into students hanging from the ceiling, faces puce in colour, upside down and screaming profanities.

Horrified, realisation kicked in, and mechanically and slowly, he peered down fearfully. He closed his eyes and gulped loudly.

"Please," he whispered as he felt a rope tighten around his ankle, "have mercy."

And then he was swung up at an alarming speed, slamming in the ceiling and his body jamming right into a metal half-loops before gravity decided to take action and he began to fall.

But then the rope around his ankle tightened and he found himself bouncing once, twice – three times, up and down like a yo-yo for a good two minutes. Good Merlin, what torturous fiend would have come up with such a horrible thing to do?

Covering his face with his hands mortified, he glared down at his cackling teacher. Of course, it just had to be his new teacher.

"My, my, maggots. It seems none of you are very aware of your surroundings but for one?"

Viridian orbs darted to the side, only to land on a smirking Veela who waved at them all smugly. The damn prig. Harry was thankful it wasn't the Veela he had versed before, or he would have regrated healing the other's nose.

"But then again, at least you lot finished showering in time." Harry could see the disgusted grimace that painted his teacher's face. "You will be let down in an hour." Somehow, Harry knew the 'let down' wouldn't be gentle. No siree, he had a feeling it was going to be a rather painful plummet instead.

The door to the change rooms opened and clanged shout ominously. The air in the sparring room felt lighter.

The inky haired teen cringed the next second, vividly wincing and shivering high up in the air. Through the blood rush he could hear loud, wailing shrieks and ear-piercing cries of pain.

He was glad. Very glad, in fact, that he was hanging around rather than in the changing room at that moment.

At least life had a few little mercies here and there. He'd gotten the lesser of two evils, for once.

.o.

He had finally been dropped down. His head was still thrumming with pain, but his left ankle had survived through its onset of torture. Bruises in violent, dark berry red and violet painted it, along with deep rope burns. He had yet to know whether he would be limping, but he suspected he would.

His shoulders and back had come out no better, as he had free fallen when the hour had struck complete and he had slammed right into the painful ground.

Groaning inwardly, he scrambled to his feet exhaustedly but still glaring at the man who stood before him with an infuriating look of superiority. The Veela who had escaped punishment.

Harry knew he was in no state to challenge anyone, so he lowered his head in a small act of avoiding attention, biting his cheek the whole way. He hated this. He hated bowing to anyone. He was his own person, and he'd be damned if he behaved how he had back at Hogwarts, all accepting and the like.

He had gotten walked upon. Used for their advantages and then cast aside.

Merlin forbid he didn't force himself to change his personality! He had locked up all his old self behind numerous locks and cages. He wasn't going to free the old Harry any time soon, either. He wouldn't. He couldn't, and he just frankly didn't want to. No more getting walked upon. He refused to be let down by heartless pricks.

Gripping his arm tightly, he shuffled off towards the exit of the sparring place. While he had been hanging around before, a golden flying ball, much like a snitch, had zipped towards him and hovered before him with a letter attached to a string on one of its wings. He had grabbed the letter quickly enough and ripped it open; the remnants of the envelope spinning down towards the ground near the Veela who scowled up at him and smoothed his hair in indignation.

Harry had rolled his eyes before scanning down the letter, hastily making note of the key points of it.

He had been allocated a dorm room, single – with a kitchenette and bathroom built in. He was in block E; floor thirteen, room eight in the fourth wing. He didn't know why, but he felt as though something was outweighing the other.

Nevertheless, that was where he was headed. He was also determined not to bump into anyone on his way there.

Edging out the door the person in front of him had swung wide open; he made his way towards the dorms quickly.

Ducking like a bonafide superhero whenever he heard a crunch, saw a tuft of hair or even _thought_ he sensed something. He grinned in pure relief as he spotted the glass plaque with 'E –' written in bold, black lettering.

The doors slid open for him without a word like those automatic doors back in the Muggle realm, and he stepped in apprehensively, eyeing every darkened corner suspiciously.

It was empty – good.

On each wall of the large, beige painted square room were two sets of lifts. Eight altogether. A set of doors dinged open when he accidentally lent to close to one of them. His magic had become curious and mischievous; lashing out and forcing the button to light up.

Inwardly he scolded it but the only response he gleaned from its aura was that it was amused at him. He failed at locking it up. Why did he have to have magic which defied him? Urgh. It kept him alive at times, sure, but when it was curious…it was worse than a baby kitten in a yard full of yarn!

He shook his head to rid himself of his thoughts. He was getting really out of things lately.

Turning his attention to the doors which had just opened, he looked inside interestedly. The lift was sparse and spacey with plain wooden floorboards and a large mirror at the back which read "SMD". It also came with music that suited his tastes perfectly.

But as he stepped forwards to enter the lift, he veered off towards the stairway suddenly as he heard another loud ding. Metal doors slid open just as he managed to yank the stair door open and pull it shut, starting his silent run up the stairs.

Sure he was acting like a wuss by avoiding people, but he would stop as soon as he knew that he could handle himself without his magic lashing out unconsciously.

But first things first. He had to start with training himself. He was not going to take getting beaten up daily for no reason. If he at least tried to learn how to fight and got beaten, he'd take it better than just slacking off and hiding for the rest of his life.

And so, at the top of his "to do" list came stamina.

His feet automatically fell into a rhythm of running up two steps then down one, running up two steps then down one; and he was managing perfectly fine.

For the first flight of stairs that is.

As he hit floor two, he was already a sweaty, panting mess – his pain from his earlier sparring and fall burnt into his body. He kept running though.

With his inky hair plastered firmly across his forehead – nails digging into the palm of his hands and his heart feeling like it was one fire and scorching his lungs at the same time, he collapsed somewhere on the fourth floor. Merlin, he felt weak.

With a loud, choking cough, he collapsed to his knees in exhaustion, leaning heavily against the wall.

"Thank Merlin the wall is cold," he rasped half to himself, still gasping for some much needed oxygen. Never had he thought himself so lucky for having such a simple thing so easily.

Pinching his nose, he scrambled to his wobbly legs with a soft cry of frustration as they buckled beneath him and he found himself once again becoming great friends with the dusty floor. It appeared that no one else took the stairs. Lucky, sane people.

Nevertheless he yanked himself up, bracing his forearm against the wall and leaning on it heavily, he began a much slower ascent to his floor. The numbers increased in size at an agonising rate. Level five had him internally weeping; level six his shirt a smelly mass of sweat. As he hit finally passed the twelfth flight of stairs and had entered his thirteenth, his shirt looked like it had been through a rainstorm.

His nose wrinkled in distaste at the smell wafting off of him, and he grabbed the handle to his door unthinkingly, blinking when an absolutely painful, mind-numbingly horrifying zing ran up his arm.

A live current.

"No way," he sat in front of his door Indian style with his legs folded over one another. "You've got to be kidding with me." He was rambling, eyes focussed on the door in half annoyance, half with a 'what-the-hell' look. "I did not just walk up those stairs to sit here for a break."

He was more than ready to leap at the door and demand it to open for him, when something at least did.

A foot stepped out next, followed by a long, long leg. It stepped right into the side of his vision – the door next to his had opened.

"And what do you happen to be doing?"

Gaping at the dark haired teen looked at him with a raised eyebrow, Harry muttered unintelligibly to himself before glaring at the ground and replying.

"Oh nothing much, just hanging around as one does after running up thirteen flights of stairs."

The brow rose further, almost receding into the hairline. The male teen pocketed a key and shrugged, not bothering to humor Harry with asking again. "Alright," he headed towards the lifts, "you have fun."

"Damnit, no, I'm sorry!" Harry had leapt to his feet despite his protesting body and screaming muscles. "_Please_ don't leave me out here in this state."

"In this state? You look perfectly fine to me."

Harry glared at the other witheringly without effect. "I could wring my shirt out and pour buckets of sweat over you. Does that sound perfectly fine to you?"

"No."

"Then the door? –please?" he added it on again when the other made no move to help.

"You're a pampered rich kid, aren't you," the other smirked.

Harry glared angrily at the other. No, he wasn't pampered – Merlin knew he wasn't. But everything was just starting to annoy him, particularly when he felt as though his whole world was falling apart.

"No," he hissed out through clenched teeth, before sighing deeply and closing his eyes exhaustedly. He wanted so much to be angry and show the other just how bad he wanted his fury could hurt – but he couldn't. Something held him back. His old .. no. He'd locked that up – impossible.

Maybe he was just tired. It would make sense, after all, why his personality was crumbling. He would have to go and take the potion again. It was the foulest potion he had ever tasted; which was saying something after all those years with Snape hounding his every step with the most disgusting concoctions known to wizard. He had felt like upchucking numerous times after taking even just a sip – and had found himself out cold for quite a long period of time.

Light crimson eyes watched as the dark haired teen twitched. His brows drew in and the small form of the small boy before him seemed to shrink in. He had no idea what the other was.

Sighing in annoyance he grabbed the other's hand, slicing down the middle of the other's palm in one smooth stroke with a dagger. He pushed it against the door, just above the handle.

Crimson blood flowed down freely, rolling down against the knob and bathing it in the same shade as Harry's life. There was a short flare of burning fire against the door as slowly, the name James Ilnoches was engraved deeply into it in a mess of sparking charcoal.

"Only you will be allowed into the room through normal means, from here on."

Harry didn't like the sound of that. "Normal means?"

A dark glint of amusement entered the other's eyes. "We have vampires who can warp through shadows, fae who can dance on the wind, lycanthropes who can smash through walls, and you're asking me?" Then chuckling like dark whiskey, "and let's not forget the ways the sex demons can seduce about anyone with just a flick of their tails."

Harry was beginning to feel more ill by the second. "How…absolutely lovely."

"Of course kiddo." Walking past Harry, the taller teen smirked. He raked his hand through Harry's pitch black hair as an afterthought. "You'll find it's absolutely _lovely_ indeed."

At the mocking leer on the other's face, Harry flushed lightly before marching straight into his room without a thought, slamming the door closed behind him.

He gazed around in wonder as everything seemed to be perfect. In one room coloured wooden boards were used for the flooring and a single king sized bed stood on a platform. He had a sturdy cupboard where his luggage had been nicely resized for him and was resting.

The kitchen lay to his right with a riveting colour scheme of light blues and creams, with a smoothly tiled flooring and granite bench. He had been stocked fully and freely of utensils, plates, bowls and cups. In fact, he could even see some pots and pans too! Wonderful; he was looking forwards to cooking breakfast on the weekends already.

Lastly he had two tables. One was a rather large desk in the corner; another a coffee table which sat in the middle of two couches placed so they were touching in a half triangle-like matter.

He was pleased.

Especially at the fluffy rug which rubbed softly against the soles of his feet. He dearly wanted to roll around on it, but didn't – he was way too dirty to even roll around on the floor. Sniffing beneath his arms in a disgusted fashion, he sighed. He needed another shower.

A flick of his wrist summoned his towel and a new set of clothes.

Kicking the door to the bathroom open with a nudge, he stared at the bathroom before shaking his head dazedly. Just how much money did the academy make? The bathroom was bigger than Dudley's old bedroom, and that was saying something! It held a bath which had been hollowed out into the ground, as well as a shower in the corner. There were the other basic things such as a toilet, sink, mirror and cabinet which sat beneath the sink. He had also been stocked with shampoo and conditioner.

Ripping his clothes off in his haste, he jumped into the shower. Harry didn't feel like waiting for the bath to fill. The shower knob was twisted so fast the water that sprayed out slammed Harry into the glass behind him.

"Ouch – mother of –"he wrestled with the shower knob which dearly didn't wish to close. The hot water scalded his skin and he groaned loudly before forcing his magic into the tap and twisting it with his new burst of strength.

It turned off.

He sighed and wiped his fringe out of his eyes. He would try again.

But that was to no avail. As now, he couldn't turn either of the taps back on. "Of all the luck –"

An amendment to his previous statement. The cold tap worked.

"Tre enchanting. I love today. Yes, I love Mondays with such a passion I just want to hug someone."

Hug or kill – he wasn't particularly picky at that point in time. Growling at the cold water splashing against his back, it suddenly turned hot. But not a boiling one – in fact, it was the perfect temperature for him.

He glanced down at his hands. Nope, they weren't touching the knob. He glanced at the knob. Nope, the hot water one hadn't been twisted at all.

Then he felt it.

His magic fluctuating around him; streaming down the length of his body. Showering him. Smiling softly, he cupped the water between his two hands and took a sip. Yes; it was his magic imbued right into the water.

Okay, maybe his day had looked up a little.

Sighing, he began to scrub his body relaxing, marvelling at the feeling of hot water against his sore muscles. Rubbing the shampoo into his hair and rinsing it out, he grabbed he bar of soap between his fingers and inhaled deeply.

It was one of his most favourite scents – sandalwood.

Scrubbed perfectly clean, smelling sweeter and with a noticeable lack of sweat and grime, he smiled. So sue him for being a little bit of a clean freak. But Merlin, his muscles felt so much looser and comfortable.

Slipping out of the shower and tugging his towel so it sat around his waist, he padded to the hamper with his dirty laundry in hand. He would wash them later.

Everything was peaceful and calm until he shrieked – his towel almost sliding off down his hips, as he stared wide-eyed at the bird which had scared him by tapping on the pane of his glass window.

Harry stumbled over to it, sliding the window open. A cool breeze swept through, sunlight flickering and drying the droplets of water that slid down his chest.

Far off in another building; someone inhaled his scent. Their eyes glazed over.

But as Harry gently extracted the letter from the eagle's talon, he noticed nothing. Flicking it open, he scan read it before staring at the clock which he had cast immediately after reading it. The tempus charm read it was half past six. Dinner had started.

"Ehh?"

Slamming his window shut with a loud clang of metal, he dashed towards his bedroom, slipping and sliding as he hopped; twisting around a corner at an insane speed. Silently he spelled his luggage to open and banished them all into the wardrobe without a glance. He left behind a set of clothing which he then began to tug on at a hastening speed.

Wincing all the while as his arms would get caught in a sore position, or he would bang his elbow against a particularly painfully spot, he ran his fingers through his unruly hair before grabbing his ring and pulling it onto his pinkie. He would have to remember to wear it permanently.

Dashing out the door and yanking it closed with a soft clunk, he raced down the hallways and stairs and out into the open air only to enter into a long tunnel with clear walls which enabled him to see outside. Following the directions to a tee led him to a grand hall where many were already seated. He noticed none looked up when he entered.

He also noticed that everyone sat in differently sized groups at each table, and that depending on the table, there was only people that had similar physical characteristics.

It seemed that the Veelas sat with the Veelas, the Vampires with the Vampires and so on.

And so, Harry sat at a table in the darkest corner – alone.

.o.

After having decided on what to eat as the menu had popped up, literally, into existence in his hands, he ducked his head down into the crook of his elbow, and began to doze lightly.

It felt like his fourth year in Hogwarts all over again.

Drowning deeper and deeper into his thoughts, he utterly missed the seat on the other side of his rectangular table being pulled out and sat on. He also missed the mischievous twinkle in chocolate brown orbs which swirled with crimson around the irises.

But he did not miss her scent.

"Hermione?"

"Hullo… James."

The unspoken, 'Harry' at the start, and 'Potter' at the end was unmistakable.

His head jolted up as he stared into her eyes. Her hair which had tamed down over the years had lengthened and slid over her shoulders in waves. Her skin was paler than he remembered, and her lips were dark cherry.

And her teeth – Merlin, her teeth – were sharp, point edges. _Razor_ sharp.

"They look lethal," he blurted out accidentally.

She grinned at him impishly, before her smile died slightly and she gazed at him with a serious look he had only seen her with when something bad, had, or was going to, happen.

"They are."

She didn't say anything else, but Harry knew there was a story behind it.

"Let's eat?" he held his menu over to her, only to pout in disappointment when two dishes popped into existence.

"I already ordered."

Harry's suspicions were confirmed as he watched her slice smoothly into a rare steak. She was a Vampire.

"Hermione," he chewed slowly on his mouthful of pizza. "What happened?"

A dark look entered her eyes, so full of pain and hurt that Harry didn't have the heart to press on when she didn't answer.

They ate in companionable silence, broken only by the soft mutterings coming from other tables. It seemed that the student body wasn't too keen on loud chatter.

Pushing his dish to the side once he had finished, he stared off into space.

"James? James?" - but never for too long.

He blinked owlishly at her. "Yeah?"

"I'm glad you're safe."

Harry didn't miss a beat. "I'm glad you are, too."

"I have classes with you."

Eh, Harry thought. Typical Hermione. Classes had still ended up entering their conversations. He loved that about her – he was glad she hadn't changed in that aspect. He couldn't help but wondered how she _had_ changed, though.

But then his brows furrowed as he glared accusingly at her. "How do you know?"

Grinning secretively, she waved his glare away. "I have my ways."

"I'm sure you do," he muttered around the rim of his glass. She smirked at him. Damn Vampiric hearing! "Ugh," holding his hands over his face, he had to ask. "How long have you been here for?"

"Here? As in stalking you?" she appeared to think deeply. "Since you first set foot on Nueva soil. I could tell it was your scent."

"Creepy," joked Harry, "you're more like a mongrel than anything—"

Bedlam rocked their conversation, and Harry stared wide-eyed at Hermione as suddenly their once rather empty table suddenly began bursting at the seams. In the time it took for Harry's heart to beat twice, the table had cracked apart, and he had been thrown backwards.

He stared open mouthed as he ended up against a wall, Hermione somewhere opposite him with the broken down table between the two. Harry then found it a good time to notice that there was a large mess of pale shapes that began to dart towards him. Vampires.

"James, you idiot," she sighed at him deeply, rolling her eyes. Even though she was a good ten metres away and hissing under her breath, Harry could hear her crystal clear. "I should've known you'd say something as careless like that."

"What?" he shouted over the grappling arms that threatened to hurt him. "What did I say?"

"You called me a mongrel!" She was beginning to fight her way to him, noticing that he couldn't handle it on his own against the immortal beings. "Rule number seven hundred and sixteen, you never, ever compare one race to another!"

Harry stopped cold. Oh, so he had done that. But his brain started up again quickly. "How the hell am I meant to remember seven hundred and sixteen rules?"

"You're not, you're meant to memorise _nine hundred and three _rules."

"Eh."

He looked away from her abashed, only to be caught within the gaze of raging red eyes. His orbs darted away again, only to be caught and locked within this last Vampire's gaze. It was the Vampire from next door. The Vampire was snarling at him; but the snarl didn't reach the Vampire's eyes. In fact, his neighbour looked distinctly cheery, as thought something had amused him greatly.

"Bastard!"

"No, James!" Hermione yelled over the spike of anger that arose along with the pitch of his words. "You idiot, are you trying to dig yourself –" Harry tuned her out, his anger festering into bloodlust as he stared at his next door buddy furiously.

With a burst of accidental magic, he found himself outside of the pack of furious Vampires and standing before the other. His hand had already snaked out to grab at the Vampire's collar, and he drew his fist backwards. About to launch, the only thing he could hear was the other's next words.

"Sexy."

And Harry stopped short, blinking. He stared at the other for a good, long second, noticing the smug look on the Vampire's face at having stopped Harry with just one word. Harry let his fist fly forward.

But he missed. The other tilted his head to the side with a smirk.

"Anything the matter, Childe?"

"Hn," stated Harry, before summoning out his wand. "No, nothing's the matter. Just wanna chop your head off is all. Stay still for me?"

And the furious chaos behind him grew louder. He winced at the loudness of their cries of outrage, and Hermione's startlingly short call of, "James."

He was going to cop hell from her later.

"James," cooed the Vampire. Harry blanched. What had happened to the cold Vampire who hadn't wanted to help him earlier? He much preferred him to the current seductive and cocky one.

"Ilnoches," he rebutted.

A brow rose. "Tut," the Vampire seemed to think deeply. "Ilnoches? You are one of the ancient races, then."

Harry started in surprise, before his eyes narrowed. "That is a possibility."

Suddenly his neighbour of a Vampire began to circle him, like a vulture his prey. "You cannot be an Incubi or Succubi. They hate getting sweaty for reasons other than those in the bedroom."

An outcry to his left.

"And you cannot be a Veela, as you lack the yellow hair and blue eyes."

A cry directly behind the Vampire – it seemed the Veela didn't like having their features so downplayed by such simplistic descriptions.

"There's no chance you're a Vampire."

There was a snarl of agreement from behind Harry. He frowned petulantly. They sounded much too happy to not have him.

"A lycanthrope you are not."

There were no Werewolves present, it seemed, as not a sound was uttered after this sentence.

The Vampire's eyes narrowed, and Harry gulped. The Vampire wasn't be smart enough to know that he leaked pheromones which enticed the Weres, right?

"And so, you're an Elf, a Dracken or some other small race."

_Yes_, Harry thought triumphantly. _Small race? Yes, very small – I'm safe_.

His triumph was short lived as the Vampire sniffed his neck closely. "You're not a submissive Dracken. You don't carry the scent, and well," he leered at Harry, their faces much too close for the latter's comfort, who took a step back. "You're definitely no dominant."

Growling furiously, the Vampire had no chance to avoid the spell which knocked him a good few metres backwards.

"Oh, touchy, are we?" the taunt carried on, and Harry had no idea why this guy wanted to get a rise out of him so bad. "Don't worry. We _dominants_ take good care of our bottoms."

Harry didn't think the guy meant his own ass literally by the snorts of agreement from all around the room. He snarled before snapping out rashly. "A fortnight from now – you and me in the sparring room."

"You want me that badly?"

Harry ignored him. "I'll make you eat your words," he hissed darkly, eyes flashing and molten silver seemed to alight with pure, untainted power.

The Vampire didn't seem to notice – too busy staring at the lips that formed the words to care. A slow smirk curled his lips. "If you down me once, you win."

Harry glared, but didn't oppose this.

"But if I win…" he leant in towards Harry huskily, "I'll pound you so hard you can't walk for _weeks_."

Harry frowned, that's what magic was for, right? It was almost impossible for him to be lame for weeks when he could just heal himself. He didn't really see the point in the other's gamble.

"You're naïve," the Vampire ruffled his hair, slightly annoyed. "But I'll taint you so you can't ever—ow!"

The shadow of the Vampire which had kept him in the dark vanished suddenly. Harry stared over to find his neighbour in the clasp of another Vampire. A Vampire who looked so deadly calm that Harry faltered for a second.

The voice was crisp and cold. "Lorcan, what's going on?"

_Lorcan_ – so that was what his neighbour's name was. Harry watched on as the two Vampires seemed to talk in low tones, arguing. Well not really. Lorcan was the one arguing, whereas the other Vampire simply listened to the other silently.

Finally Lorcan went silent, and Harry tuned in intently, listening to what the other Vampire was going to say. The words were razor tipped with poison, and Harry, for all he tried to play around with the words and brush them off as a simple slip of tongue, he couldn't.

"_Don't touch him. He belongs to another_."

Harry glared fruitlessly. He didn't belong to anyone other than himself. He opened his mouth to say exactly so, only to be stumped by Lorcan's next words.

"Yeah, I'm sure he does," the acidic tone was bordering on deadly, and Harry took a step back when he noticed Hermione motioning to him from the corner of his eye. It was for him to get the hell out of there pronto.

"He's not worth anyone's time, Lysander! Especially not –damnit!" he went flying back, smashing into the wall harshly. Rubble and the remnants of the table slammed into the ground as he swept it off his back. "_That does it, Lysander_. If you're not going to listen to reason, then _so be it_."

Harry leapt out of the way in time, peering back as his hand was taken by Hermione and led out the door.

The last he saw of his empty dinner platter was it being used as a discus and flung at the other Vampire known as Lysander. Then the door shut on the visage of Lorcan being pummelled into the ground.

He hoped Lorcan, for all his flirting, didn't get too badly hurt. They had their fight after all, and running up thirteen flights of stairs was going to be almost impossible for the Vampire. He said so to Hermione, who looked at him oddly.

"Harry."

Harry pretended not to understand, until she amended herself.

"James."

"Hermione," he repeated after her mockingly. They were all but sprinting out of the glass tunnel and towards the E block buildings. "How do you know where I live?"

She shrugged whilst running, tugging him along at an even faster rate. "Vampires and gossip go a little too well in hand together, especially since we can warp the shadows."

"That's right, what is that about?" He slammed into her back – damn, he winced. She was as hard as granite. "Ouch, Mione!"

"You came to Nueva without knowing the abilities of each race? James! You complete dunderhead!"

"I'm not stupid," he cried out, "I'm just badly uninformed!"

Rolling her eyes she slowed to a brisk walk instead of run, talking to herself all the while. "We're far enough, we should be safe."

"Safe," piped up Harry, "from what?"

Hermione just shove him through the doors of his block and into a lift. Ah, right. The lifts. Yeah, Harry no longer worried about Lorcan. The Vamp could take a hike. He had a _lift_, after all.

"Merlin, James, you're far more curious than I remember."

Slowly, Harry replied, not looking her in the eye. His mouth opened and shut mutely before he finally settled on whisper, "_People change over time, Hermione_."

Swallowing and holding her hand over her eyes, she replied.

"I know, James. I know."

Harry didn't know why but a tear trickled down his cheek.

It felt so painful being called James by her.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note<strong>: Okay, so yeeeeess, I found my hard drive! Don't ask where. I 'm really embarrassed over the fact I searched for so long only to find it the day I had school. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. I have yet to go over it but I will over the weekend, hopefully.

I apologise for the late replies to all of your reviews as I didn't exactly want to be caught up by negative emotions as I wrote.

But yes, replies right now! I hope you all got yours.


	7. Decision Time

Gosh it's been ages. But i'm still alive. So, it has come to this...

All of you are at a crossroads. Decide the fate of this story!

Either I do a massive overhaul on this story and rewrite each chapter anew, or I abandon this.

I haven't updated in, what, two years? Mainly because there are many elements to this story I honestly can't agree with anymore.

One such element is his mates (which is severely bugging me), another, as to where this story was initially going. I've re-read over my notes and the original seventh chapter that was meant to see the light but to no avail, I can't take it.

I've hit my senior years in high school, and sadly this story is still on my mind despite it being ages.

Therefore I have a placed a poll on my profile.

I'm just mentioning that me rewriting this will be a slow sailing ship and very different after the first 1-3 chapters-ish. It's either that or I abandon/put this up for adoption.

The outcome is in your hands.


	8. Roses Have Thorns

The new version of Nueva, "_Roses Have Thorns_", is up.

Thank-you for your patience and support!


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